


Track Marks

by hissingmiseries



Category: Emmerdale
Genre: Addiction, Angst and Hurt/Comfort, Drug Abuse, Drugs, Established Relationship, Family Drama, Future Fic, Gen, Heart-to-Heart, Loneliness, M/M, Past Drug Use, Past Lives
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-05-16
Updated: 2016-10-01
Packaged: 2018-06-08 15:54:15
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 12
Words: 33,030
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6861700
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/hissingmiseries/pseuds/hissingmiseries
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Robert has a habit of getting addicted to things that aren't good for him.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Prologue (Work)

**Author's Note:**

> So, let's try this again.

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> "Just chicken pox scars, from when I was a kid," he says, and silently prays that his boyfriend doesn't notice how perfectly they line up with his veins.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you very much to Jenny (scrapyardboyfriends) who drew [this gorgeous storyboard](http://hissing-miseries.tumblr.com/post/147594650127/scrapyardboyfriends-roberts-descent-into) for the fic!

Robert wakes up one morning, scratching his arm.

It's subconscious, more than anything. Usually upon awakening, he finds his arms draped around Aaron, or bent awkwardly beneath his sleeping body, but today his nails are painting white lines down his forearm. He doesn't even notice until ten minutes later, when he's peeled himself from the bed and padded downstairs to the smell of coffee, and the sleeve of his dressing gown shifts up to reveal the inflamed skin and reddened roads. 

He doesn't pay much attention to it.

It happens again when he's sat at his desk in the Portacabin, a wad of papers glaring back at him, his teeth chewing on the end of a pencil and his fingers grazing over the flesh, burrowing into it. The feeling barely registers, his mind too focused on the sheets of numbers pleading to be organised, until he pulls his hand away and the want rears its head back up. It's like a gnat bite in the summer heat - irritatingly relentless.

It happens again when he's sat on the couch of the back room with Aaron, watching re-runs of soap operas as the day draws to a welcome close. He does it until his boyfriend realises, yanks back the older man's sleeve and peers at the carvings that Robert's been working on.

Robert say something must have bitten him.

Aaron asks what all the little circular marks that litter his forearm are.

Robert says that they're chicken pox scars, left over from childhood. Neither of them know if infant illnesses leave such permanent reminders, but neither of them care to wonder. 

"Just chicken pox scars, from when I was a kid," he says, and silently prays that his boyfriend doesn't notice how perfectly they line up with his veins.

In the right light, the marks disappear completely. They're only properly noticeable on close inspection, when looking specifically for the holes in his skin. His arm couldn't be used to scare children in school assemblies; it's not like the mess that  _Requiem for a Dream_ shoved in people's faces - deep and chasm-like, purple with swelling and infection. His arm thankfully never reached that stage. After years of neglect, they're merely pin-pricks now, miniature bullet holes that are finally beginning to heal.

He continues scratching idly until his skin finally begins to protest, opening up and blossoming with cat scratches. That surprises him - this particular square of flesh on his left forearm has taken years of abuse, enough to the point where it rarely wears and tears any more, and as Robert looks down at the friction burn that's begun to fester, it makes him wonder just how long he's been scratching there without realising it.

 

* * *

"Robert, could ya drop Liv off at school?"

The school run involves mad dashes for the door and teenagers lingering as long as they physically can to try and miss the bus. It also involves the adults of the house tearing their hair out.

"What's the point?" He has a meeting he needs to get to with Nicola. "She won't go in anyway."

"Which is why ya should drop her off at the gates and watch her go in."

"And what's stopping her making a bunk five minutes later?"

" _Please._ " Aaron's eyes are wide, exasperated. Robert can't resist.

Ten minutes later and he's driving through the streets of Hotten, eyes lingering more on the clock than the road because he can hear Nicola's fingers drumming with impatience. Liv is beside him, cheeks red and homework not done, and she scowls at him when he watches her walk far enough into the school for her presence to be noted.

Then he does a U-turn and speeds back to Emmerdale, on the fringe of the speed limit the entire time, and is met with Nicola's frustrated glare as he charges through the door of the Haulage Company.

"Thank God," she hisses, dragging him aside. "Where have you been?"

"Calm down, I'm barely ten minutes late," he hisses back. A smart man with greying hair and a crisp suit stands on the other side of the wall, awaiting some sort of transaction. 

"Ten min- I don't care if you're ten _seconds_ late, you are _not_ losing us this deal." 

It goes without a hitch, but Johnstone regards them both with disgruntled eyes and resists their combined charm and puts it an offer that they both know is lower than it should be. It's big, but it's not big  _enough_ , and he can feel Nicola's eyes burning into the back of his head when he shows Johnstone the way out.

"You should have just told Aaron that this business deal was more important than his bratty sister skipping school," she snaps when he relays his excuse. Clearly she isn't in her usual chirpy mood. "Man up, will ya?"

Those words burn into him as well.

 

* * *

 

How the hell is scrap metal so taxing?

Aaron's tearing a car apart outside, and Robert's inside, finally leaving his arm alone to instead bury himself within sheet after sheet of blue inked numbers, of telephone numbers to contact, of books to balance, of meetings to schedule. They're running rampant in his head, and colliding with all the tasks that need doing for the Haulage company.

It's nearing evening, the sky turning a shade of plastic pink, but Robert's barely half done and there's no way he's letting this roll into tomorrow.

Adam drops in with two coffees, two cardboard cups brewing caffeine, and places the Americano on the corner of Robert's desk like it's routine.

"Me and Aaron are going for a drink after we're done," Adam announces, peeling off his gloves and taking a seat in the swivel chair. Rob's eyes don't rise from the papers. "Wanna join us?"

"Can't," is Robert's curt response. "I've gotta finish all this. Thanks, though." He doesn't need to look up to feel Adam's brow furrowing.

"Mate, you've worked late all week." There's hints of... is that  _concern_ in Adam's voice? "Aren't you knackered?"

"What do you think this is for?" he replies, gesturing with his pen to the coffee, before the nib touches the paper and he's writing furiously, like his life depends on finishing this calculation and jotting all this down. Adam watches with a frown, half expecting smoke to come billowing from the friction.

He pulls out his phone, texts Vic, then puts his gloves back on and heads outside. The door slams slightly behind him.

He's  _not_ worked late all week. That's merely exaggeration. Sure, he's stayed behind an hour or two, but it's not like he's held his eyes open with tape and stayed awake by candlelight; there's work that needs doing, and since him and Aaron agreed that Robert does all the talking and paperwork in this business (that high-vis jacket never did suit him, anyway), it's his  _job_ to get this complete.

Besides, it's his boyfriend's business. He could never forgive himself if he was the cause of it going under.

Therefore everything has to be immaculate. Rarely does he allow himself to slip - being a businessman is in his blood - but with two corporations now sharing his time, double the effort has to go into getting everything complete. Both of his desks are overflowing with neon post-its, screaming important dates and to-do lists at him, and there's a satisfying feeling when he manages to tear one down and crumble it up and throw it in the bin. The Portacabin looks pretty bland right now, which is welcoming. He tries not to think about his Haulage desk, which currently is lit up like Christmas with yellow squares of paper. 

The door opens again, and in walks Aaron. A few curls of hair have escaped the layer of gel that flattens them.

"How come you're not coming with us for a drink?" he questions, sounding more concerned than demanding. Looks like Adam's blabbed.

"I've got to finish this," Robert parrots in reply.

"Finish it tomorrow."

"I can't, I've got stuff for the Haulage company to do tomorrow." His list of errands to run is expanding by the hour. 

"Right," Aaron says, sounding defeated. "Are we still on for dinner tomorrow night?"

"Course." Robert doesn't remember organising that, but he nods blindly, not sure he even heard the entire question. Something about tomorrow night. Still, maybe it  _will_ do him some good to have an evening away from the workload.

The air falls stagnant, and Aaron hovers for a while, chewing uncertainly on his bottom lip as he searches for something to say. It feels strange, watching the older man who, whilst it's no secret that he's a master at anything that involves exchanges of money and services, looks like he would happily drown in the paperwork if the chance was given to him. When he's not writing, his hands jolt from place to place - to his mouth, nibbling distractedly on his thumbnail, or tapping rhythmically on the side of the desk, or wrapping round the coffee cup and bringing it to his lips. Or--

"You're scratching again," Aaron observes before hanging up his jacket and leaving for the night. 

Robert looks over at his idle forearm. He doesn't start to feel the burning until his eyes fall on the red patches of skin.

 

* * *

 

When he can't sleep, he works. Sometimes the bright screen of the laptop awakens Aaron, who rubs his eyes and complains that no sane human being does work at one in the morning. Robert takes the hint and heads downstairs.

The numbers swim slightly across the screen, and Robert feels anchors tug on his eyelids, but that's easily solved with two or three strong coffees, made by stopping the kettle just before it reaches boiling point as to not wake the entire pub.

There's so much to be done - emails upon emails upon emails, so many it feels like his inbox is a never-ending pool, and even if one a.m. replies raise a few eyebrows from his clients, it's better they receive their replies in the midst of caffeine-driven insomnia than after a long day with Nicola going on in his ear, when he's ready to throttle something.

The next morning, when he's perched at the breakfast table and Liv is once again busy with taking as long as physically possible to get ready for school, Charity flamboyantly walks in and immediately remarks on how Robert looks like "death warmed up." He throws a sarcastic smile in thanks back to her, and ignores the side-eye from Aaron that's burning into the side of his face, asking why he didn't come to bed until three o'clock in the morning.

"Couldn't sleep," he explains when they get in the car. A thick ringbinder rests on Robert's lap. Aaron's driving. "I just had a drink, watched a few episodes of Game of Thrones and got tired."

He hates lying to Aaron - the words feel bitter on his tongue - but sometimes it's necessary. Though karma isn't a good friend, sometimes his little white lies fly beneath its radar, and it keeps things smooth between them, it's worth the risk. Aaron smiles a lot more now, genuine smiles that reach his eyes; they're so perfect, they're worth the rough patches they fight through.

(One day in the near future, after overhearing a particularly heated row, Charity asks Robert about when he became such a doormat.)

 

* * *

 

_are you alive???_ Robert's phone buzzes with a text from his boyfriend.

_yeah, just finishing up at the scrapyard._ He replies, fingers dancing over the keypad.

_what happened to dinner 2night???_

Robert's eyes flicker over the clock. Half past seven. It completely slipped his mind.

He types back some half-arsed reply, one that not even himself is convinced by, and returns his hands back to the laptop, ignoring the pounding in his head. The screen feels like it's being burned onto his retinas; every time he blinks, the white square remains, tattooed to the inside of his eyelids.

His arm is on _fire_. When Robert's sleep-deprived eyes focus, the holes in his skin, the ones he was so sure had healed over and numbed, seem to ache - and the only relief he can provide is digging his nails in and scratching until the flesh is red raw with trauma. He tries not to let himself get too distracted from the work in front of him, but as the sun sinks behind the Yorkshire hills and casts the scrapyard into night, he finds himself studying his forearm in the dim light of the Portacabin.

His arm is on fire, his hands have a life of their own, and his track marks are pulsating for the first time in six years.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hopefully things go better this time round and school doesn't consume my life as much as it was. I've seen addiction headcanons floating round Tumblr for ages, and obviously I tried one attempt at writing, but to be honest I'm glad I'm re-starting because the other one was going to go nowhere. Hopefully attempt #2 goes better!


	2. Caffeine

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> "Bloomin' hell, Rob," she scoffs, her voice jokey but the furrow in her brow expressing voiceless, sisterly concern. "You better hope this place doesn't get searched, cause they'll think you're a dealer!"

Robert can no longer make it through the day without a cup of coffee.

The Haulauge company is having a clear-out and Aaron and Adam's questions are becoming irritating, so he sets up a makeshift desk in the café, complete with laptop, writing pad and calculator.

He's running on four hours of sleep, so he orders an Americano to keep him going. Three hours later and the only thing he's running is Bob's coffee machine, into the ground.

The elderly man throws glances over every few minutes, hands over the beverages with a furrowed brow, notes the dark circles and frequent scratching but doesn't voice any concerns for fear of sticking his beak into Robert Sugden's business. He's learned over the months that when Robert's in a grouchy mood, he has a certain venom to his voice that makes people wince.

The majority of Bob's income that day comes from the school kids dropping in for lunch and Robert's coffees.

Unsurprisingly, he doesn't sleep very much any more. Robert spends most of the night lying awake next to Aaron, listening to the gentle snore of his sleeping boyfriend who has grown more clingy in bed recently - no longer can he get up and retrieve the laptop as he often has two long arms wrapped around him, or a head nuzzled into the crook of his neck, preventing him from moving. Although Aaron is usually pretty grabby when asleep (a stark contrast to when they're awake), there's something about this time round that feels different. His grip feels tighter, more suffocating.

The caffeine isn't entirely the reason for his insomnia. The thoughts of work, of how much work is left to complete, also refuse to leave his brain.

One morning, whilst he's sat at the dining table, nibbling on a piece of toast and muttering about the five Excel sheets he forgot to print out, Aaron asks why he's suddenly become so obsessed with work.

Robert says it's how he earns a living, and now he has two companies, he needs to work a lot more.

Chas butts in with a remark about how he also needs to get some decent breakfast down him. She's like a mother hen with the squawk of a parrot.

 

* * *

 

The wastepaper bin in the Portacabin fills up swiftly with disposed cardboard cups and screwed up balls of paper.

Robert's rifling through a stack of old paperwork, sorting them into ones he can keep and ones he can toss, starting off enthusiastic (Adam walks in and loses five quid on a bet that Robert can't score ten paper balls in a row from across the room) but as the fatigue begins to take him over, his movements slow and his eyelids droop. Caffeine highs seem to be wasted on him - they crash down too quickly.

The Americanos begin to lose their effect, and Robert takes that as a sign that he needs to  _sleep_.

Five minutes after he gets home at eight p.m., with Aaron and Liv exchanging banter over a television quiz question in the background, he curls up and nods off on the couch, not bothering to shrug out of his coat or shoes.

When he wakes up, it's nearing five a.m., and he's still knackered. He tries to get back to sleep, but then he remembers he has a Skype interview with a client in about three hours, and there's no way in hell he's missing it.

 

* * *

  

Throughout the interview, he constantly catches glances of himself in the smaller screen, sees the contrast of the greying eye circles against his pale skin, and although the person on the other end seems none the wiser, the true dishevelment of his hair and clothes cuts into his concentration until he's too busy studying the wrinkles(?) by his eyes to hear the persistent questions of his client.

They end on a stale note, and his eyes fly to his phone, dragging up the front camera. After a few minutes, he convinces himself that it's just the bad lighting in here that's causing him to look so grey. Just the shadows that are hollowing out his cheeks.

When lunch rolls around, he declines Aaron's offer of the pub and instead takes a trip into Hotten.

He downs an espresso in the first café he finds, the concoction almost thick enough to chew, so bitter he can feel it sticking to his throat as it descends; it's vile, but for a good ten minutes, he can feel sugar surging through his brain and his veins and he manages to get a bit of work done in that little coffee shop.

Imagine an old-fashioned radio; turn the knobs, listen to the signal climb and fall rapidly, the white noise crackle violently then suddenly quiet. That's what Robert's brain feels like after no sleep and five cups of coffee within two hours. It's not enough.

Before he heads back to the scrapyard, he drops into Tesco, scans the medicinal aisle for caffeine pills. The white box of ProPlus screams at him from the shelves, beckons him with its stark red text and promises of "fatigue relief".

_"Adults and children over 16 years: 1 to 2 tablets with water if preferred, as required during the day. Do not exceed two tablets in three hours, or 8 tablets per day. Unsuitable for children under 16. If tiredness persists, consult your doctor."_

He downs two, three, four in one go with a swallow of coffee, and drives back with the radio on full blast, seeing colours in high saturation for the first time in days.

 

* * *

 

Robert can no longer make it through the day without ProPlus.

Vic drops by the Portacabin with lunch prepared for Adam, and whilst on the hunt for a pen to scribble a note on the back of her hand, opens Robert's desk. Her face contorts at the sight.

"Bloomin' hell, Rob," she scoffs, her voice jokey but the furrow in her brow expressing voiceless, sisterly concern. "You better hope this place doesn't get searched, cause they'll think you're a dealer!"

Aaron pops up over her shoulder, and Robert looks over just in time to see his boyfriend's face pale considerably.

The little silver trays that pills come in, the ones with the rounded corners and foil tops, blanket the inside of the drawer amongst abandoned documents and drained pens. Some are empty, some hold little white ovals of artificial energy yet to be consumed, and yes, at first glance, it looks like something the boys in blue might raid in a crack den. But they're only caffeine tablets; it's not like they're ecstasy pills to send him bouncing through the fucking ceiling.

"How many of these are ya supposed to take?" Aaron enquires, picking up one of the trays and frowning at it.

"Like eight a day," is Robert's nonchalant reply, which earns incredulous stares from the two most important people in his life. "Check the box if you don't believe me."

"How do you sleep?" Vic says, squinting as the reads the blue text on the rear of the crumpled packet. 

"He doesn't," Aaron grumbles. Robert feels eyes burning into him again, feels his skin smouldering where the look penetrates. Or maybe it's his arm again.

 

* * *

 

After forty-eight hours of sleeplessness, where the sheep have fallen asleep themselves and all there is to fill the air is a persistent ringing in his ears, Robert jolts up at two a.m. with a churning in his stomach. He barely has any time to register what's happening before he feels bile shooting up his throat, burning on the way, and he flies into the bathroom with a hand clamped over his mouth.

He retches violently into the toilet, shadowed in darkness until the light suddenly activates; it half-blinds Robert, who shivers as his abused forearms settle on the cold porcelain, and reveals a sleepy Aaron bolting in, kneeling beside his boyfriend and placing a supportive hand on the older man's back. It's comforting, warm, a gentle touch of reassurance that Robert more than appreciates as the contents of his stomach empties. There's barely anything there to throw up - eventually it's just painful bile, that strips his throat like paper from a wall. 

"Are ya alright?" Aaron says when it's all over, voice gruff and jagged. 

"Yeah, fine," Robert nods, attempting to stand but instantly sitting back down when his head begins to spin. "Must have eaten something bad."

"You've barely eaten all week," he frowns. He's not wrong. "It's all those fucking pills you take. Robert, they'll make ya ill."

"You sound like Vic," he groans, with a chuckle embedded in there somewhere, but Aaron doesn't see the funny side.

" _Please_ sleep," he pleads, eyes wide and puppy-eyed, regarding Rob with such pity it's bordering on nauseating. "Take the day off tomorrow and crash out."

A few months ago, the idea of skipping work would have been refreshing, a welcome break, but now it almost breaks him out in a cold sweat.

"I can't, I've got-"

"Adam'll deal with all the paperwork," he cuts in, obviously having rehearsed his answers to Robert's excuses. He's not that transparent, surely. "And if Nicola comes round looking for ya, I'll tell her where to shove the bloody haulage stuff. You're allowed a break, ya know."

Normally, their roles are reversed, with Rob crouching beside his shaking boyfriend, comforting him in times of need, telling him that life is allowed to owe him a break every now and again; for Aaron, that's true. Life has continuously dealt the young man bad hands, with too many of them picked out by Robert, and after so many bumps in the road, this is the closest to stable their relationship has come for months. He owes Aaron so much, and the thought of lying in bed, _choosing_ to be totally useless when there's so much  _work_ that needs completing appals him.

"Let me go get a drink," Robert groans, mind finally calm enough to stand without spiralling, and Aaron's supportive arms remain like scaffolding around Robert's lanky, pyjama-clad figure. "Go get back in bed, I'll be in in a minute."

Aaron reluctantly obliges.

Robert takes the chance, disguised by the rush of the flowing kitchen tap, to rummage through the cupboard above the dishwasher - the one dedicated to storing the medical supplements of the house. And no, he isn't looking for ProPlus. Right now, staying awake is the least desirable thing on his list, just below painful death. 

He vaguely remembers the small blue pack of prescription sleeping pills he uncovered a few weeks ago whilst searching for antihistamines.  _Sleepeaze._ Once used by Chas for her PTSD, now they just sit in the back of the cupboard, tucked behind the paracetamol, only missing two tablets from the three trays.

 _"Adults and children of 16 years and over: one tablet 20 minutes before going to bed._   _ **Do not** take a second tablet in the same night._   _Swallow the tablet with water._   _Do not give to children under 16 years._ _Do not take more than the amount recommended above._ _If symptoms do not go away, talk to your doctor."_

He takes two, knocks them back with water, then removes a full tray and slips it into the pocket of his hung-up coat.

He figures he needs to catch up.

 

* * *

 

Thirteen hours later, whilst Aaron's at work (busy searching up caffeine side effects on WebMD on his phone), Robert stirs.

His head's foggy, feeling like it's stuffed with cotton wool, and the bad taste of last night still lingers on his tongue, but that's the least of his worries when he sees the sheet next to his head stained crimson.

For a few seconds, the source of the blood remains a mystery, but then he moves and his forearm screams in protest at the activity. When he pulls it from beneath the duvet and examines it, even Robert winces at the sight he's met with.

He's clawed relentlessly at the patch of skin in the night, torn it open with unconscious determination. His track marks pulsate again, aching for something, for the feeling of being filled - after all, it was a needle that created them, it's understandable they want to be complete again after six years of neglect. Not that he'd ever return to that low. He promised himself that the second he stepped into rehab, back when his hair was brown and his life was a shambles.

Savlon is his saviour, so when he's done smearing his wound in the stuff, he pads back downstairs to an empty back room. It's rare to see the dinner table so lonely. Aaron's at work, Charity and Chas are (probably bickering) in the bar, the kids are at school... silence, for once. It's bliss.

He can't stop himself brewing a pot of coffee, though. Three strong cups and two ProPlus pills later, he can feel his heart fluttering rapidly in his chest, and energy coursing through his system. It's such a rush, a feeling that can't be brought along by a decent night's sleep or exercise or whatever the doctors recommend for fatigue; it's... well, it's  _addictive_.

And Robert would know all about that, wouldn't he?

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This is only going to be a short fic - five or six chapters in length if things go to plan. Thank you for the awesome reception to the first chapter!


	3. Alcohol (I)

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> "Why'd you chuck out my pills?" he asks, unexpected levels of hostility in his voice. "How am I supposed to sleep without them?"

After twelve hours of artificial sleep, Robert rummages through his laptop bag to find that Aaron has dumped out all his ProPlus, the little shit.

He throws a multitude of things away in the morning so he can search the bedroom wastepaper bin, the bathroom bin, the kitchen bin, the green wheelie bin outside - nowhere. 

The coffee has conveniently run out, according to Chas, so as he sips tentatively from a glass of orange juice over breakfast, the stacks of buttered toast unappealing and the bowls of cereal tasting like pencil shavings; the only thing he thinks about to motivate himself to bother getting up is the Word document that desperately needs completing or he'll crumble. There's a skyscraper of Excel sheets that Nicola sent through the previous day, the ones that Robert really should complete today because he spent all of yesterday crashed out on the couch, trying to sleep naturally but instead fidgeting with irritation. Partly because of his arm, but mostly because of how much  _time_ he was wasting. He's an adult, not a kid pulling a sickie to avoid school, so as each hour passed with absolutely nothing productive to show for it, he grew more and more restless until he ended up taking two sleeping pills and sleeping the day away.

"I'm going to the Haulage company today," Robert says as they clear the table. Aaron frowns, like he always does. "We've got a meeting, and you know what Nicola's like when I'm late." 

Maybe that last part isn't entirely true, but at least it gives Aaron no chance to disagree with him.

"Take it easy, yeah?" Aaron mumbles, stacking empty plates. 

"Course," Robert says, and before they head out the door, he plants a quick kiss on his boyfriend's forehead as he shrugs on his suit jacket. It provokes a small smile, one sided and brief but enough to convince Robert that he might have smoothed over some worries. With another bite of toast (which he actually ends up spitting out in the bin outside), he heads out to the Haulage company, running on vitamin C and the beginning of a headache.

 

* * *

 

"Oh, for god's sake, Robert, just go 'ome!"

Nicola's voice is possibly the most annoying thing he's ever experienced. It slices through his drowsy brain like headlights through fog.

"Do you want these spreadsheets doing or not?" he argues back, sitting up straight and rubbing the sleep from his eyes. How the hell is he so tired? He slept throughout the entire night - Aaron had to shake him awake, and Robert grouchily stirred to see the relieved face of his boyfriend, not missing the flash of worry in the blue pools of his eyes.

"Not if you're gonna fall asleep every five minutes!"

They're swarming in papers, ringbinders and expanding files littering the desks, and phones are going off left, right and centre due to some overdue order that Robert can't remember ever reading, so he assumes that Jimmy must have moved it somewhere or tossed it by accident. Nicola's busy working herself up into a frenzy, hair escaping its bun and falling in loose strands around her face; she dives into her desk drawer, pulls out a stapler and goes to work on the corners of about twenty different sheets.

"'m fine," he grumbles, opening up the eighth spreadsheet in the workbook and shuffling around some numbers. "I didn't get much sleep last night." Another lie, but it's less embarrassing that admitting he needed to drug himself up to sleep, and now he's craving more drugs to wake himself back up.

"Robert, I'm a businesswoman and a mother who lives with a child, _and_ my young daughter," she replies blandly, glancing up at Jimmy who walks in with a sandwich hanging out of his mouth, looking sheepish. "Your life is easy. Jimmy, darling, make us a coffee, please."

Jimmy complies, bringing them both steaming mugs of caffeine, and Robert has his down in four gulps. It barely makes a difference.

 

* * *

 

He walks through the rest of the day feeling like he's underwater.

When he turns round and, sight blurry with sleep, knocks a pencil pot off of his desk, Nicola gives in and forces him home.

"Rob, you're home early," Vic remarks when her brother walks into the pub, catching the sluggishness of his limbs and the hollowness of his face. "Want a drink?"

"Just a coffee, ta, Vic," he replies, causing Victoria to stop in her tracks, and when her mouth hardens into a straight line, Robert's brow furrows. "What?"

"Well... Aaron kinda told me not to let you drink coffee."

"What is he, my babysitter?" Robert scoffs; if he doesn't get some sort of caffeine down him in the next hour, he can't promise he won't pass out wherever he's standing from sheer fatigue. Reaching into his jacket pocket to retrieve his wallet, his hand gropes around upon feeling how empty the pocket is, and the penny drops when he realises that the silver tray of sleeping pills are no longer there.  _Bastard._ "Fine, a bottle of lager, then."

She hands him the bottle, doe eyes wide with that pitying look that Robert seems to be attracting an awful lot lately. 

With a huff, he un-caps the bottle and downs it faster than he normally does. Aaron's still at work. He uses the few hours of peace he gets to grab a booth, pull his laptop out and work until the numbers melt from the white screen. No matter how low he turns the brightness, it feels like he's staring directly into the lights of Times Square, like his retinas are being burned from his sockets but he  _has to get this complete._ There's a pay check waiting at the end of it all, alongside some sort of feeling of accomplishment; he misses that feeling, one you can only get from reaching something you've been climbing for. It used to be Aaron, scrapping for his affections, teasing him slowly in the back room and making him struggle not to yell when the entire house is asleep and they have to be careful not to wake everyone up.

They've barely been intimate in the past month. They've hardly been in the same state of consciousness for long enough.

When Aaron and Adam walk in, laughing over some inside joke, Robert snaps his laptop shut like he's been caught stealing. The two boys exchange glances with Vic that speak entire conversations.

Later, when they're sat on the couch at opposite ends and Robert's head is lulling, eyelids are struggling to stay open, he speaks.

"Why'd you chuck out my pills?" he asks, unexpected levels of hostility in his voice. "How am I supposed to sleep without them?"

A few seconds pass without an answer, so Robert looks over, and is met with a look that only be described as bemused disgust.

That says all that needs saying.

They continue watching _How It's Made_ in silence, the air feeling more suffocating than it has in a long time.

 

* * *

 

Robert has his boyfriend's sleeping body tangled round him, limbs entwined, keeping him in place with as much determination as the younger man's subconscious can muster.

Robert can't breathe.

The bedside clock is the only light in the room, screaming out  _3:05_ in red numbers, and the whistle of English night wind outside is driving Robert up the wall. He's awake, teetering on the edge of sleep but not quite reaching it, stuck in some sort of rebound insomnia and it's  _excruciating._ No matter how still he lies, how long he keeps his tired eyes closed for, how comfortable he gets beneath the sheets, how  _anything_ \- nothing works, and it's driving him mad.

Not even work is appealing right now, despite his knowledge of a meeting the next day with Nicola, and although his veins feel like lead pipes running through his body right now, he knows he has to do _something_ to try and tire him out further, if that's even physically possible. It takes some doing, untying himself from Aaron, who grumbles under his breath but thankfully remains unconscious; the sense of triumph is instantly extinguished when he stands up, and the room begins to spin, forcing him back down.

For ten minutes he sits on the edge of the bed, head in his hands, ears ringing like church bells. Then he realises that his hands are shaking.

Nausea carries him from the bedroom to the bathroom, where he spends a further ten minutes crouched over the toilet to no avail, before he downs a glass of water and stumbles downstairs, bleary-eyed and head feeling like it's about to burst. Death would be a welcome relief right now, he thinks, as he finds himself cleaning out the medicine cupboard in search of any sort of sleeping pill. There's everything _but_ \- Aaron's picked everything clean like a vulture.

What else could knock him out cold, apart from a fall from the second floor?

Something springs to mind, but he swallows it back down.  _No. You're done with all that._

Another hour of aimless pacing passes, his bare feet wearing the carpet thin, before he collapses on the couch as the room turns dark. Chas finds him two hours later, coaxes him back to consciousness with water and orange juice and a decent breakfast that he struggles to keep down.

 

* * *

 

"Mum, I'm worried about 'im." Aaron voice trembles as he chews on his thumbnail, hair rough with curls and brow wrinkled with worry. Chas stands opposite him with a mug of tea and an identical expression.

"Is it true he was nicking my sleeping pills?" she asks, to which Aaron responds with just a hesitant nod. "No wonder he can't sleep, love - if he's knocking himself out with pills and you've chucked them out, he's gotta withdraw from them."

"It's... I dunno," he mumbles, folding his arms across his broad chest. His hoodie fits snug across his shoulders. Robert's shirts are starting to look too big for him lately. "When 'e's not trying to sleep, 'e's working, and 'e's skipping lunch just so he can keep working, and he never eats any more, and I just... I dunno what to do."

He's not crying, but he's pretty close. Chas sighs, puts her mug down and steps forward to embrace her son. Despite her growing fondness for Robert in recent months - maybe it's the way he looks at Aaron like he's everything to him - he always seems to be the source of trouble.

 

* * *

 

He can't tell which withdrawal symptoms are worse - the caffeine or the pills - but he knows that it's a trap, and he's falling for it.

Robert doesn't go into work today. He wolfs down a bowl of cornflakes, vomits them back up twenty minutes later (Aaron kneels beside him, rubbing the small of his back, drowning in painful deja vu) and sinks into the plush cushions of the couch with a groan.

"Promise me you won't try an' work today," Aaron says as he gets Liv and Noah ready for school. Liv casts him a look over her shoulder, face contorted with disgust at how pathetic her brother's boyfriend is. "Just try and sleep, yeah? Look, maybe I should take the day off an' all--"

"No, don't you dare," Robert stops him - there's no way he's allowing his stupid  ~~addiction~~ situation to be a burden on his boyfriend's daily life. "Go in, I'll be fine. If I can't sleep today, I'll go to the doctor's."

That seems to convince Aaron, so he leaves, Liv shit-talking Robert on the way out. Aaron doesn't argue her.

 

* * *

 

"Vic, pour us a pint, will ya?" Robert asks as he trails into the bar. Kerry and Dan shoot him a look from their booth. He doesn't look back.

"Aren't you supposed to be taking it easy today?" she frowns, but she can't refuse his service - Charity's lectures burn in the back of her mind - so she fills a glass with the amber liquid and hands it over, accepting the note from him and putting it into the till. 

"I'm not at work. That's easy enough."

Chrissie and Andy are curled up in the corner, her practically on his lap, whispering things in his ear; Robert's not sure if it's the withdrawal or that pretty sight that churns his stomach. They notice him looking, and Andy grimaces at the sunken appearance of his usually handsome-looking brother. His face isn't easy to look at on a normal day, but there's something about the hollows of his cheeks and the rings beneath his eyes that make him look like he's just risen from the dead. Clearly things aren't going smoothly for him.

Robert agrees.

It's the lack of sleeping pills in his system that causes his muscles to tighten, so as the alcohol begins to run through his body, it unties him, loosens him slightly, and it's a welcome feeling after so many days of shaky hands and itchy skin. Victoria side-eyes him when he orders a second pint, then a third, and after the fourth she sighs and starts to pretend she can't hear his requests for a refill. 

He lives in a pub. He can find alcohol somewhere.

Robert slips off the bar stool and returns to the back room, his shell, and searches through the fridge until he finds a six pack of beer. It's Aaron's beer - Budweiser, because Aaron has terrible taste - but it's  _alcohol_ and it works. He sneaks upstairs to his room to avoid being uncovered by Chas, and lies beneath the covers at one o'clock in the afternoon, drinking until he feels sick because he knows that if he drinks enough, it'll knock him out. It'll make him sleep. And right now, he's so desperate, it's worth all the risks.

He hasn't looked or felt this physically pathetic in a long time. Well, he says a long time - six years flies by in a blink.

Six years ago, when he was in this exact position, in a different bedroom, it was heroin he was cramming into his system by the bucket-load. 

Heroin to alcohol. The lesser of two evils.

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Yeah... maybe this will be more than six chapters. Oh well.


	4. Alcohol (II)

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> _Drug addiction is an illness, not a crime_ , is a phrase that was parroted multiple times to him at rehab. He couldn't agree more.

Over a month passes since the drinking incident. Not a word about it is spoken, and Robert spends the entire time walking on broken glass.

He can't remember much, either about the drinking or waking up at three a.m. to an empty bed and dead limbs. The beer cans have disappeared. Someone's clearly been here whilst he was passed out.

His alcohol tolerance isn't impressive, so maybe that binge was a little excessive.

But he _slept_.

He spends the next month carrying on as normal, trying to avoid the way Aaron edges round him like he's a landmine.

In fact, he tries  _harder_ than normal. He avoids pills, avoids the medicine cabinet altogether, and swallows his nausea until he gets to the Woolpack, where he can vomit up the contents of his stomach without Aaron instantly being by his side. He avoids working overtime, instead savouring his boyfriend's relieved smile when the clock hits half five and he closes his laptop; the voices in his head yelling  _failure_ follow him all the way home.

"Do you wanna drink?" Aaron asks him when they reach the pub. Vic gets out two pint glasses instinctively. 

"No, I think I'm gonna get some kip," Robert replies before yawning, which surprises both of them, but pleasantly. "I'm knackered." There's hope in Aaron's eyes. Maybe everything _is_ going back to normal.

Robert pecks his boyfriend, bids Vic goodbye and makes his way into the back room. He kicks of his shoes, shrugs off his coat, and is asleep within a minute of curling up on the couch. Liv peers at him from the dining table, but keeps her words behind her teeth.

His sleep schedule's all over the place, but at least he's finally sleeping unaided.

A few hours later, when last orders have been called and Liv's retreated to her room, he stirs, opens his eyes to find Aaron perched on the floor in front of the couch, sipping from a Bud. The television's blaring with white light, projecting some television chat show that's gone downhill in recent years, and the volume is turned down to merely a hum.

"What time is it?" Robert grumbles as his eyes adjust to the brightness. 

"Almost ten," Aaron replies, shifting round to face the couch. "You're not gonna sleep tonight now, are ya?"

"Well, I'm sure we can do something else to fill the time," Robert says, propping himself up on his elbow and placing gentle kisses down the side of Aaron's neck, who lets out a huff of amusement and squirms slightly. He doesn't disagree.

 

* * *

 

Robert aches for  _hours_ after him and Aaron are finished, lying nude beneath the sheets and still feeling his boyfriend's fingerprints pressing into him.

He rolls over, feels the body next to him unconsciously react to the movement. A lazy arm falls over his side. Keeps him there, pinned down.

It used to be Robert who fell asleep immediately after sex.

His forearm, rusty with scabs and still tender to the touch, has risen red again after the rough activities and from the way Aaron's fingers curled around it for support; in the heat of the moment, Robert barely felt the pain, and the few nerves that protested only spurred him on further, but now their heartbeats have returned to normal he's starting to feel the pain. God, it was never like this when he was shooting up. It hurt, sure, itched with irritation, but his marks have never yelled with such a vengeance before. 

They're craving. He isn't, but they are.

He hasn't ingested caffeine in days, not felt a pill slip down his throat in a month. He works normal hours now, laughs with his co-workers and has a beer with them afterwards. He's going back to normal.

It feels strange.

Withdrawal symptoms still claw at him, and a quick Google search confirms that it's the sleeping pills leaving his system that is doing their best to leave their mark. When he's at the Portacabin one day, he sits out of a game of darts because he can feel his hands shaking, and hides them under the desk; often he'll feel his limbs jolt and spasm slightly whilst watching television, and feel his brain cloud halfway through completing a spreadsheet. During a day's work at the scrapyard, as Adam and Aaron take a car apart outside, Robert overhears Adam mention rehab. He instantly holds his breath.

"He's fine," Aaron says, probably too fast. "He's not done anything for ages."

Robert breathes. 

That night, he dreams about rehab, and wakes up sweating at two a.m. He convinces himself it's the withdrawal.

 

* * *

 

When Nicola storms into the Haulage company and announces that Johnstone wants another meeting, Robert immediately volunteers himself.

"I'll go and meet him in Leeds," he says, shuffling a stack of papers round as Nicola looks at him sceptically. She still hasn't forgiven him for being ten minutes late for a meeting aeons ago. "He'll probably be less bitter if we go to him this time."

"I'm sure he won't be bitter at all if you're _on time_ ," she bites back, giving him a pointed look. He rolls his eyes.

 

* * *

 

As he packs an overnight bag, Aaron stays splayed out on the couch, feet up on the table and flicking through the day's paper.

Robert asks if he wants to join him three times in five minutes.

("Nah, you're all right. Not sure if I can trust Adam alone in the scrapyard anyway."

"You sure? A day out in Leeds would do you good. We can have a laugh when I get out the meeting."

"It's ya job, I don't wanna get in the way, that's all."

"You wouldn't be! Come on, I'll need something to cheer me up after dealing with Johnstone for two hours."

Aaron chuckles, shakes his head dismissively.

"Sorry, mate. You'll be fine.")

Robert doesn't want to sleep alone, but he doesn't want to drag his boyfriend with him by the hair, so he says goodbye to him throughout the night through the kisses down his body and the whispers of his name against his throat.

 

* * *

 

The bar he meets Johnstone in is pretentious for Leeds, even in the heart of the city; it's swanky and hazily-lit and far too fancy for casual drinking. Every customer, like himself, is dressed up in sharp suits or swaying dresses, and sipping daintily from wine glasses that look like they could shatter at the slightest knock. He finds the pre-booked table in the corner, orders an expensive beer and lets his eyes wander. Couples sit together, clearly on a night out, whilst some parties of friends sit around a long table and clink their beverages together with grins and cheers. Robert, however, looks like a disheartened boyfriend who's been stood up by his date.

Johnstone finally appears ten minutes late - probably his form of revenge - and Robert gets a rush from talking about work. It's been a while.

Two hours pass, flying at some points and dragging at others, and while Johnstone is not a particularly interesting person, he's  _loaded_ , and Robert wants his cut.

Luckily everything goes without a hitch. They part ways with a handshake and promises of further contact, and as Johnstone carries himself out into the evening city, Robert lets out a huge sigh of relief and orders a bottle of wine to celebrate.

He doesn't care how sad he looks, drinking a bottle by himself at a table, but he has something to celebrate. His phone provides some entertainment as Aaron texts him anecdotes from the scrapyard, but it only makes Robert ache at how much he wants his boyfriend with him. Crappy B'n'B rooms in Leeds are their thing, their trademark, and it feels wrong walking into his cheap room with greying sheets and no aircon without someone - someone in particular - to share the bed with.

The bottle slowly diminishes throughout the hour. Robert attracts some weird looks from the waiters, but they keep their distance.

By the time he reaches the bottom of the bottle, the wine has kicked in, triggering a thudding in his head at first that is then dulled by the pleasant looseness that alcohol brings. After the stress of the meeting, his perfectionist qualities keeping tabs on every word he said and every move he made, it's nice to have something relax him - something he can  _feel_ coursing through his veins. 

The lesser of the two evils.

Somewhere in the back of his mind, he knows he's looking for a replacement for what he used to do. He  _knows_. The work, the pills, the drink - they're all cheap replacements for the junk. Coming off of the drugs, pulling himself back to earth from the high, was the hardest thing he's ever done in his life, and although he knows he's better off because of it, he seems to have an... well, an  _addiction_ to trying to plug that gap.

He spent a year shooting up into his veins. He's spent six years as sober as he was supposed to stay. He's in the best place in his life he could be now: out of the closet, in a stable relationship, being teased by his 'mother-in-law' and earning a decent income (he doesn't miss the unlimited supply from the Whites. Just saying). 

His past, however, is a mystery to his family. Aaron, Vic, Andy, everyone. That decade he spent away stays in the shadows, concealed from their eyes because Robert doesn't want them knowing what he was really like back then. How _stupid_ he was. How stupid and pathetic and  _weak_ he was to let himself be lured into such an obvious, glaring trap, and still fall for it.

Everyone knows the horror stories about heroin; if they don't drill it into you at school with graphic pictures of dead junkies, watching  _Trainspotting_ seems to put most people off pretty quickly. All of the before-and-after photos of addiction, showing angel-faced college girls and studs with cut-glass jaw lines transformed into dead-eyed, patchy-skinned zombies against prison backgrounds seem to do the job.

 _Drug addiction is an illness, not a crime,_ is a phrase that was parroted multiple times to him at rehab. 

He couldn't agree more.

 

* * *

 

When he gets back to his prison cell of an overnight room, he's fucking smashed out of his tree.

It turns out that when Robert stopped to actually  _taste_ the wine he was necking down his throat, the flavour was one of the best he's ever tasted in a wine, fruity and metallic and enough to down in a few gulps. Getting drunk on wine in a fancy restaurant in Leeds. How painfully middle class. It's something he'd do when he lived with the Whites.

He flops down on the bed, feels the mattress squeal beneath him and, after pulling his arms from his jacket and yanking off his tie, promptly passes out.

He dreams about Aaron first, then the drugs, then Aaron again. Whichever one has him jolting upright and shaking furiously as the sun crawls up, he doesn't know.

 

* * *

 

His original intentions to catch an early train and get back into Emmerdale by dinnertime go out the window when Robert finds a cheaper bar with quality drinks.

He spends a few hours in there, lazily sipping at pints and flirting with the young barmaid to try and get some free snacks (he's charming, and he uses it). Leeds alcohol is surprisingly good, not as bitter and overwhelming as he first expects it, and by the time he's emptied his wallet on top ups, his walking is ever so slightly staggered; not enough to be noticeable, but enough for him to feel it.

The train ride home lulls his hazy brain to sleep, and when he reaches Emmerdale and Aaron's there to pick him up, he stumbles forward to kiss his boyfriend.

Aaron responds, and pulls away with a frown and a thousand questions on his lips that Robert doesn't want to answer.

"Right, come on, you," the younger man mumbles, a dull - almost  _sadness_ - to his voice, like his worst fears have come to life, that crushes Robert inside a little. "Let's go 'ome."

_Lesser of two evils, Robert. Lesser of two evils._


	5. Alcohol (III)

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> "First all that work, then pills," Aaron says, defeat in his voice. "Now booze. What the hell's next?"

Robert's laptop breaks down on him half way through modifying an invoice. He fishes out Aaron's from beneath the bed and opens it to an NHS webpage about alcohol dependence.

At first, he's confused. His head is rather fuzzy from last night, where he headed out for a meeting in Harrogate and ended up rounding the night off with a few drinks in a posh bar - if it wasn't for the roots he's since grown, he'd up and move to Harrogate in a heartbeat - but it's not like he's drinking enough for it to be considered an 'addiction'. He's not clawing at the wine cabinet every five minutes, gasping for a drink. He's not  _Laurel_. So if it isn't him, who else in the family could it be, someone close enough to Aaron for him to bother researching it all.

His mind flickers to Liv, to the bottles of vodka she's notorious for swiping.

Things must have gotten really bad.

The invoice is boring, and a tad on the expensive side for a haulage company, but Robert doesn't care; he just briefly glances over everything, transfers the money and wraps his lips around a green bottle, sipping lazily. The hum of chatter from the bar rolls in through the corridor, through to the back room, where he sits with his feet up and the laptop burning a square onto his thighs. Charity yells at someone, her shrill voice bleeding through the walls.

He signs into his email account and is greeted with a list as long as his arm, all screaming with apparent importance. 

The laptop sings as another email arrives, addressed from Nicola, banging on about some lorries that've ended up nowhere near where he sent them - like Robert can do anything about that now. He can practically hear her yelling at him through the screen, screechy and parrot-like, pointing an accusing finger at him and going on about how this is all his fault. He was mad to buy into that place; it's become the bane of his existence.

Feeling his arms ache, he checks every blue box and deletes everything in one click.

"In't that work stuff?"

Liv's raspy voice materialises from thin air - or more specifically, behind his shoulder - and cuts through the fog in his head, causing him to jump like a startled cat. 

"D'you mind?" he snaps, angling the laptop away from her as she makes her way over to the kitchen, rifling through the cupboards for a snack. Her school shirt hangs un-tucked and her collar sticks up awkwardly. "It's rude to read over people's shoulders."

"Alright, calm down," she scoffs at him, pulling a packet of biscuits from the top shelf. "I were just sayin'."

"I didn't ask you to saying _anything_ ," he grumbles, reaching over to the beer bottle and taking a sizeable swallow. Anything to block her out.

"What's up wiv _you_?" the teenager frowns, offended at his outburst. "PMS-ing or somethin'?"

He's about to bite back when the noise of the bar suddenly heightens and Chas walks in, teeth gritted with irritation after a run-in with Charity. She spots the two of them at opposite ends of the room, and feels the chewable tension that resonates between them. Immediately, she sighs.

"What are you two going on at each other about?" she drawls, the frustration in whatever Charity's got herself into clear in her voice. Robert just glares at Liv, and she glares back. They look like kids on the playground. 

"Robert's deletin' all his work stuff," Liv says, nonchalant, and Robert scowls because can he go five minutes in this house without someone tattling on him? He sinks back into the arms of the couch, staring idly at the screen with square eyes, not seeing the bemused look Chas is shooting him.

"Not like you," she comments unnecessarily. "I thought work was all that got you running these days."

"Yeah, well, go nine-to-five with Nicola every day and you'll end up hating it as well," he sighs, taking another sip from the bottle. Chas eyes him the entire time.

"Liv, did you take the six pack out of the fridge by any chance?" She splits the brief silence with the question, her voice full of knowing that Robert immediately catches onto; it was actually him, the result of a particularly stressful day in the office where everything went wrong and fell down like dominoes, and one can turned into two, then three, then four until all he was left with was the plastic yoke that held them together. He didn't even notice how fast he was going through them. The snap of the can opening was satisfying, as was the liquid inside.

"Nope," she replies, voice flat. "Aaron must've 'ad 'em."

"Hmm," Chas says, and Robert feels her eyes on him. He doesn't look up. "Must've done."

 

* * *

 

Aaron complains the next day when he realises the six pack has gone, but falls silent when Chas whispers that it was Robert who took them.

"You're gonna have to talk to him about it at some point, love," Chas says, but she's more than aware that her words are falling on deaf ears; Aaron has never been the confrontational type, unless it's with fists, or lead pipes. Sitting down and talking to someone, especially Robert, about something they both know will just instantly be shut down before any true conversation can begin; it isn't the best plan in their arsenal. Aaron's brow contorts, rubbing his sleep-tired eyes with a long sigh.

"He's just gonna deny it," he huffs, leaning back against the kitchen counter, looking smaller than ever in Robert's too-large t-shirt and tracky bottoms. "What am I supposed to do when he's just going to say I'm bein' paranoid?"

"He listens to ya, doesn't he?" she says, folding her arms across her chest. "I doubt he'll pay any attention to Vic. I mean, no one likes their little sister harpin' on at them. But you're different."

"First all that work, then pills," Aaron says, defeat in his voice. "Now booze. What the hell's next?"

Chas sighs, and steps forward to envelop her son in a hug. He clings to her, desperate, and does his best not to cry.

 

* * *

 

Charity is the only one at the bar who no longer hesitates to serve Robert a drink.

("He can drink himself into a ditch as long as he's bringing in profit.")

Chas frowns, sucks on her teeth as she pours the pint and hands it over. Victoria flat out refuses after three or four pints, tossing Charity back into the bar and disappearing into the back room.

Robert doesn't understand. He's not _that_ excessive of a drinker.

"You stink of booze," Liv scowls as she passes him on her way out. Aaron, who's perched on the other end of the bar, gives her a glare as she goes. She rolls her eyes at him.  _I'm not wrong._

 

* * *

 

Eventually, Robert silences his laptop, blocks Nicola from bombarding him with any more emails. He tosses the computer onto the couch cushion next to him and deflates with a groan. He needs a drink.

Before has the chance to locate some alcohol going spare, the door cracks open and in walks Aaron, with Robert's hoodie nestled over his broad, slumped shoulders. The deep burgundy suits him so well, better than it ever did Robert; it both slims him down and emphasises his shape, the bulky physique that contrasts Robert's lanky frame perfectly - like two jigsaw pieces.

Robert loves him. He loves him so much.

"Hey," Aaron greets him, hands buried in his pockets. He's almost hunched over, eyes tracing the cracks in the floor. "You look knackered."

"I feel it," Robert replies, resting his head back against the couch. He wants to taste wine on his tongue. Aaron will do for now.

"How's stuff wiv Nicola goin'?"

"Ugh," he groans. "I have a new-found respect for Jimmy, putting up with her all day. Y'know, she's literally banned me from sorting the orders out now because apparently I'm 'not to be trusted', just because the drivers were morons and picked up the wrong directions."

Somewhere in the back of his head, Robert isn't entirely convinced he gave them the right directions in the first place. He dismisses the idea. He's not an idiot.

Aaron bites his bottom lip, looking like his contemplating something, before he perches himself on the arm of the couch and looks down at the older man with wide, worried eyes that instantly fill Robert with concern.

"Robert, um..." he begins, in a guttural tone that makes it sound like he's been crying, like his throat is thick with emotion. His eyes glisten in the light. "'ave you... 'ave ya noticed how much you've been drinkin' lately?"

"God, not this again," Robert huffs, any ounce of concern now replaced with frustration. 

"Seriously, Robert, you're puttin' it away like it's ya job," he continues, Robert's response making his heart ache. He _knew_ this would happen. His mum's words ring in his head, and he takes a deep breath, ploughing on forward. "Are you alright? You're not..." Pause. Sigh. "You're not gettin' addicted to it, are ya?"

If it wasn't so considerately put, Robert would have stood up there and then, stormed out and slammed the door behind him; just the mere suggestion of addiction, of somebody so close to him (even unknowingly) daring to suggest that he's slipping back to his old, self-destructive ways, burns his brain with offence because  _how dare he?_ Robert knows what addiction is. He knows what addiction's like. He knows what it's like to be awake at three a.m., a belt tightened around his lower biceps, feverishly tapping the crook of his elbow to summon the vein to the surface, where he can insert a needle and send toxins coursing into his system. He knows what it's like to depend on something so much that he can't sleep, can't _function_ without it - and he got over that _years_ ago. He's a different person now. And yet here his boyfriend is, staring down at him, accusing him of being something he couldn't be again in a million years.

"For fuck's sake," Robert hisses, almost spits, and both of them physically react to the anger that's present in his voice. "You drink like a fucking sailor but no one says you're an alkie."

"I'm just askin'," Aaron says, defensive, frowning at the unexpected reaction. "We've never seen ya drink so much bef-"

"Who's  _we_?"

"Well, me, Vic, me mum - even Adam's noticed that's somethin's up."

"And since when has it been any of Adam's business?" The older man replies, voice rising to a yell that has Aaron's eyes nervously darting to the door. Robert isn't sure whether he's looking for someone to walk in, or waiting to get out at first chance. "Or  _yours_ , for that matter?"

"I-I'm just lookin' out for ya," Aaron stammers, emotion welling up in his eyes. "This all 'appened with the pills, a-and you used to be so obsessed wiv work but now ya never go in-"

"I don't need a babysitter, Aaron!" Robert snaps, causing Aaron to startle, and he quickly decides that he doesn't need to listen to this. He scoops his coat from the back of the couch, shrugs it onto his figure and retrieves his phone from the kitchen counter. Aaron stares hopelessly the entire time.

"Why don't ya just  _talk_ to me?!" 

The door slams behind him. It resonates throughout the pub.

 

* * *

 

 _Fuck_ , he needs a drink. He drives and drives, out of Emmerdale, out of Hotten, through the evening streets until he comes across a quaint little town with an equally quaint little pub.

It's one of those public houses where the community knits together, where each punter knows the lives and secrets of each other and gossip spreads like wildfire. The barmaid, an attractive young blossom with green eyes and a mop of brown hair, glances up from the till at the sound of the door opening, and is immediately intrigued at the sight of somebody new.

"Evenin'," she smiles sweetly as he approaches the bar. "Not seen you around here before."

"No, I'm just here on business," he replies with equal warmth, offering her his hand. "Robert."

"Alice," she introduces herself with a grin. "Want a drink?"

Two hours later and Robert has completely forgotten the barmaid's name. She's refrained from speaking to him for the last half an hour, instead casting him uncertain glances as he makes his way through a variety of different drinks, beginning with cider and evolving to vodka. Fuck, he misses vodka; it's been too long since he necked back a decent shot. The pub is rather empty, what with it being a Tuesday night, but the few punters that have lingered have stayed out of his way, exchanging muttered opinions about the strange, posh-looking twat in the corner who's getting pissed by himself at the start of the week.

The bell rings for last orders, and the customers rise, bid goodbye to each other. Robert staggers to the door, and just before he manages to get himself into his car, a deep voice stops him.

"I think you've had one too many to be driving, mate," the voice says, and Robert's hazy sight and brain take a moment or two to match it to a face. It's a small, balding man by the door, his lips curled around a cigarette. "Let us call you a taxi, and you can come back tomorrow to pick your car up."

When he crawls into bed that night, it's nearing three in the morning. Almost instantly after settling beneath the sheets, Robert feels the weight beside him shift. Aaron rolls over, turning his back to his boyfriend, repelling the body like they're a pair of matching magnets.

In the drunken haze of the darkness, he spots his track marks; bullet holes in a white wall. His veins swim under the surface, shallow blue worms that writhe and crave for something to pierce them.

He hasn't wanted heroin this much in six years.

Of course, he isn't going to succumb to it - withdrawal cravings are natural, rehab said, and can last for years if the addict took a significant amount. He has more self-control than that. 

There's only two ways you can destroy the cravings like this: give into them, or numb them with something. Weed, pills, speed... alcohol.

He passes out, doesn't fall asleep, and dreams about drugs until the sun comes up.


	6. Cocaine (I)

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> "I'm sorry." Robert choked out. It's his go-to word whenever Aaron's pissed at him. It never works, but it's not like Robert knows why he does this. Maybe he did once upon a time, back when more than two bottles of beer a day was considered pushing it, but those days were months ago. He's changed since then.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Apologies for the short break in chapters! Thank you to everyone who's still reading this, and congratulations to the cast of Emmerdale who did extremely well at the BSAs!

"Mornin', love! Robert not with you?"

Aaron storms through and out of the bar with a face like thunder. Chas and Victoria exchange concerned yet knowing glances. Neither of them bother going after him.

The argument probably roused half of Yorkshire from their sleep. It definitely woke Chas and Charity, who came stumbling blindly down the stairs, their hair sticking up in various directions and their faces naked of make up; they missed any exchange of words, but arrived in time for the tension to eat away at the silence until it became too awkward to behold and Aaron piped up.

"Sorry, mum," he mumbled, unclenching his white-knuckled fists. "Go back to bed."

She obliged, not wanting to find herself trapped in another one of her son and his boyfriend's common conflicts. Charity lingered for a little longer, unable to not ask a few questions, but eventually Aaron's glare chased her back up the stairs. Robert had sat slumped on the couch the entire time, head bowed like a wilted flower, his posture unchanging since the start of the argument; a mix of drunkenness, nausea and self-disgust had killed any real fight left in him. Something that Robert's discovered over the past few months is that a little bit of alcohol makes him frisky, careless almost, but a lot of it makes him sluggish. It makes his limbs feel like dead weight, and clouds his head to the point where nothing can fit in there aside from whatever bottle he's sipping from. 

"That's probably why he's drinking so much," Victoria offers when Aaron opens up to her one day, over lunch. "I'll try and talk to him, see if it gets him anywhere."

It turns out, there's rarely a window in the day where Robert doesn't have a drink in his hand. The Woolpack refuses to serve him - even Charity is beginning to see just how bad things are getting - but that doesn't stop him; he just takes to the bus or the car and finds another pub, one where they don't know him. As soon as they start referring to him by his first name, he skips town, finds another bar that's further away and full of stranger faces. Before long, Robert finds himself tunnelling into Leeds city centre, catching the train there and whatever form of cheap transport back. If his wallet's empty, he stays the night wherever he is, often not remembering where.

Last night - or, more accurately, this morning - was one of the lucky days. It ended with Robert crawling back in at two a.m., words slurred and legs weak, only to find Aaron waiting for him in the back room, a stark contrast to Robert's relaxed frame. He was tense, frustrated. Robert's stupid drunken mind couldn't fathom why.

"I'm just-- Robert, I'm sick of ya!" he ended up spitting at the older man when they'd switched levels. Aaron took to the floor, pacing backwards and forwards until he started wearing it thin, and Robert just sat and listened to it all. Every mouthful of abuse, every insult, he felt them all crash down onto his shoulders and surround him until Aaron's throat gave in and thickened with choked-back tears. "I'm sick of what you're doin' to us! Goin' out, comin' home off your fuckin' head, stinkin' of booze everywhere you go! Ya never come into work, ya never do anything with us any more - you're always either pissed or spark out and I'm  _sick of it_."

Robert kept his eyes on his lap and fiddled with the zip on his coat.

"Aren't ya gonna say anythin'?" Aaron eventually asked, exasperated. 

"I'm sorry." Robert choked out. It's his go-to word whenever Aaron's pissed at him. It never works, but it's not like Robert knows  _why_ he does this. Maybe he did once upon a time, back when more than two bottles of beer a day was considered pushing it, but those days were months ago. He's changed since then.

"That's all ya ever say!" Aaron's never satisfied when it comes to arguments. "Would it kill ya to _explain_  it?"

_I don't know why I do it._

To be honest, it's not as much of an argument as it is an outpour - Aaron's outpour, and it's brief (his words die off when he realises that Robert isn't responding), and not as cutting as Aaron probably intends. Maybe because he's too drunk, maybe because he's heard it all before.

They were interrupted by the mother-in-law and the crazy pub owner, which Robert sends up silent prayers for because honestly, it was starting to get monotonous. He used  that excuse to escape.

("Are you done?

"Yeah. For now. Are ya comin' to bed, or are ya too pissed to walk?"

"I'll take the couch. You head upstairs."

"Why? So ya can sneak off again?"

"No, so I don't disturb you. And I stink of booze, like you said, so I'm probably going to go get a shower.")

Aaron sighs, and gives up.

When he climbs the stairs and passes Liv's room, he's almost sure he can hear crying. He holds still for a few seconds, and is met with silence. 

Liv sees her brother's shadow lingering on the other side of the door and also holds her breath, tears streaming down her cheeks like bullets. Her pillow's damp. She hates seeing Aaron upset, hates hearing his anger more; all this shouting and screaming reminds her of bleaker times. She wishes he'd never met Robert - the nutcase who claims to love him has caused nothing but havoc for all the time she's lived with them, and now he's an alkie, drinking himself sorry in bars and fucking up his business since he never goes into work any more.

One day, she overhears Aaron and Adam discussing the mess that the books at the scrapyard are in. She overhears a lot of interesting things in this pub.

One day, she's going to get rid of Robert for good. That whole deal with Ryan was a bluff. It's nothing compared to what she knows she's capable of.

All three of them fall asleep at different times, though none before the sun starts rising and lightening the sky. Liv drops off first, tear streaks set and feeling like marble against her skin, able to crack at any moment. Aaron is next, in a similar state to his sister, rummaging through his brain for reasons why this could be happening; is it his fault? Did he say something, do something even subconsciously that might have turned Robert into whatever the hell he is now. Robert is a few hours later, more in the late morning than anything, after a hot shower and cleaning his teeth to rid him of the stench of alcohol. The couch takes the shape of his body easily. He's been spending a lot of time sleeping here in the last few months.

 

* * *

 

His sleep schedule is practically nocturnal now, so when Robert stirs, it's approaching nine o'clock at night. He's slept through the entire day. The back room's empty except for him.

When he tries to sit up, his limbs ache, but not as much as his head. The sudden motion of lifting his head from the cushion already has the room spinning like a carousel ride from hell. Immediately he has the urge to vomit, one which is quick to act - luckily he manages to fly upstairs to the bathroom and throw up nothing but bile.

It surprises him when he realises that Aaron isn't beside him, rubbing his back and asking him if he's okay.

It's a silly thing to get upset over, but it hurts.

His legs drag behind him as he descends the stairs, and his arm is limp against the railing; his knuckles are practically dragging on the ground. He needs to _wake up_. Caffeine barely makes a dent any more, no matter how many double espressos he swallows - it's like pouring water into a car engine and expecting it to run.

Knowing that his appearance in the bar will earn him a few comments - especially since he can hear Cain's booming voice from all the way up here - Robert grabs his coat and scarpers out of the back door, his hangover amplifying each slight sound into gunshots, and every measly light into a blinding lamp that burns his retinas. Thankfully, winter is coming on thick and fast, bringing early nights along with it.

He doesn't want to insult Aaron by taking his car, so he catches a bus, two buses into Leeds and finds a quaint student bar, tucked away in a back alley. He looks a little old amongst the twenty-year-old university students who are all decked out in piercings and obnoxious t-shirts, but he doesn't particularly care; he needs a drink, and he needs one soon.

To his surprise, he doesn't get a chance to drink. Instead, something else comes along.

  

* * *

 

It's the smell of the takeaway next door that triggers his gag reflex, and has him speeding to the cubicles to throw up again.

This hangover has knocked him on his arse.

Like all student bars, the toilets are disgusting; grimy and smelling like carnage, but he's too busy to care when he's busy gagging into the toilet bowl and feeling the bile burn his throat on the way up. Fuck, you'd think he'd be used to this shit by now.

As cramped and airless as the toilets are, there's a handful of people taking up the space, a gang of youths all crowded in the corner, very obviously taking advantage of the lack of CCTV in here and doing drugs without a care in the world. Nothing hardcore, as such - one of them is bent over the sinks, his head crushed against the counter and a thin line of white powder disappearing up his left nostril, almost bowling him over with its instant effect. His mates cheer him on, grinning like idiots, before one of them notes the presence of a clearly older man and freezes.

"Don't stop on my account," Robert mumbles, before gesturing towards the sink. "Can you and your coke budge over?"

They oblige, sharing weary looks as Robert washes his hands, his eyes on the remaining three lines of cocaine that the boys have yet to devour.

One of the guys catches his eyes.

"Sell ya a bump for a fiver," he offers, accent think with Yorkshire, and Robert frowns.

"I think I'll live, thanks."

"Oh, go on, mate," Another one pipes up, his friend's encouragement having instilled him with confidence. They're both idiotic - for all they know, Robert could be an undercover cop - and a bump for a fiver is either the label on very high quality coke, or seriously overpriced chalk dust with a few hints of stimulant mixed in. Back in the days, before the track marks blossomed on his forearm, he dabbled in enough cocaine to keep himself sharp between the ears for months on end; it was a personal favourite of his, and a personal favourite of Craig's, who used to funnel it up his nose like it was going out of fashion. "It's good shit."

"Yeah, I bet it is," Robert drawls, going to dry his hands beneath the hot air of the hand-dryer, before the lankier one of the lot sends him a look of daggers. None of them want those lines being blown across the bathroom. "How much of it is flour?"

"Why the fuck do you care?" one of them grumbles.

"I'd take it now, mate," the obvious leader spouts - he's a gangly thing, complete with ugly jumper and lens-less glasses, who looks like the complete opposite to what one would usually imagine a coke dealer to look like. Maybe the coke is what he needs to pull. "You're not gonna be able to later, when you're pissed."

That's a good point; even the most sober of priests knows that drugs and alcohol aren't a pretty combination, especially ones that have opposite effects, like coke and five pints of lager.

"Like I said," Robert replies. "I'll live."

And he does. He gets drunk again, in the corner of the bar until he can hardly see straight, and catches a taxi back home, crawling in at half past one and collapsing on the couch. He dreams about his old life, about the old faces he used to know. God knows what they look like now.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sorry for this one being pretty short - it's kind of a bridge between one addiction and another.


	7. Cocaine (II)

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> "Hmm," she repeats, watching her son-in-law disappear through the doors to the toilets. "It's a bit of a 180, though, in't it? Keep an eye on him, love."

When Robert pays for the bump of coke, he thinks of Liv, of how she's probably rolling her eyes right now.

When he arranges it in a line, he thinks of Adam, of how he's probably slagging his brother-in-law off for being such a moron.

When he snorts it, he thinks of Aaron, of how his heart is probably breaking in two.

When it hits his brain, he thinks of how  _alive_ he feels. Of how he wants  _moremoremore._ As soon as physically possible.

He hasn't done cocaine in a while - he traded one white powder for another - but the feeling of it rushing through his bloodstream is an old, familiar ache. He reprimands himself throughout the entire process, much like he does when he does pretty much anything nowadays, but it doesn't stop him. It hooks him, reels him in. It makes him feel awake for the first time in months.

Don't ask him how, or why, he ended up here, because he doesn't know. It's early, only passing cars providing any sort of light, and the streets of Leeds are _crawling_. Aside from university students, the scum of the city rises to the top come the witching hour; which is why Robert is out here, drunk beyond his wildest dreams, snorting cocaine off his sleeve and handing over notes like they're nothing.

It turns out, taking coke whilst drunk doesn't immediately short-circuit his brain. Of course it doesn't, he's done it before; if he ignores the images of his poor abused organs cooking beneath his ribcage, the powder adds a somewhat sobering effect. It's impossible to describe - his motor skills are no better than before, and he couldn't drive any safer if someone stuck him behind the wheel, but it's like everything's sharp. Like the world has sharp edges and he could cut himself on them at any time.

His heart is going ten to the dozen inside his chest, almost painfully, feeling like helicopter blades and signalling that the single bump he's ingested is more than enough or it could topple him. It takes almost a minute to regain himself, push himself off of the brick wall of the alleyway, and when he starts walking he doesn't stop - mostly because he's scared that if he stops, his legs will go from beneath him.

 _Fun fact: the mixture of alcohol and cocaine produces a highly toxic substance in the liver called cocaethylene._  
_Fun fact: mixing alcohol and cocaine can be fatal up to twelve hours after it's been taken._  
_Fun fact: this combination can result in death much more quickly than in the presence of cocaine alone._

He knows all this; it was run through him during his time in rehab in an attempt to scare him from ever touching the substances again, and for a good few years it clearly worked. He stayed sober as a judge and, after a brief period of total abstinence from every narcotic in the book, he managed to get back onto alcohol, without blowing it overboard. Alcoholism was never really his thing, anyway.

His wallet feels empty in his pocket, his wages having disappeared over the past few hours, but there's enough in there for a taxi home and a small rock of coke.

He buys one, ignores the creepy look on the teenage dealer's face and heads back home. It's not even midnight.

Aaron looks relieved when Robert stumbles in. Disgruntled and irritated as always, of course, especially when he smells the alcohol lingering on Robert's breath, but there's still relief in there somewhere.

At least, Robert thinks there is.

 

* * *

 

"You're up early, ain't ya?" Liv comments over the breakfast table.

It's eight in the morning, way earlier than Robert's used to being awake at, and it shows in the scruffiness in his hair and the circles beneath his eyes. Still, he's awake, running on a breakfast of cereal and his weight in orange juice.

"Aren't you supposed to be in school by now?" he grumbles back.

"It's Saturday."

"If you say so."

She rolls her eyes, and lets out a noise of disgust that's so similar to her brother's it almost gives him flashbacks.

(The cocaethylene in his system will be potentially fatal for another three hours yet. As long as he doesn't end up face down in his cornflakes, he assures himself he'll be okay.)

Aaron shows up next, in a jumper that's too small across his broad shoulders, and shares the look of surprise with his kid sister at Robert's appearance at the breakfast table - the older man's seat has usually been empty for the past few months, and now there's somebody there. Sure, the figure sitting there looks a little rough around the edges, a tad thinner and dishevelled, but it's familiar and Aaron can't put his relief over such a tiny thing into words.

"What're you doin' up?" he questions, and now it's Robert's turn to roll his eyes.

"It's eight in the morning."

"That doesn't normally stop ya," is the response. Liv crunches her toast, watching them with suspicious eyes. "You're normally still spark out at this time."

"Bloody hell, I'll go back to bed if you're that bothered," he groans with a swallow of orange juice. The tension in the morning never used to be so palpable.

Salvation comes in the form of Liv's phone ringing, summoning her to Gabby's house for a day out in town, so as soon as Aaron manages to usher Liv off to the bus stop, he swoops straight back to his boyfriend with a catalogue of questions on his tongue. Robert's head is full, fuzzy, trying to think of literally anything apart from his craving for drink - the loose seam in his t-shirt, or the grain in the wooden flooring that runs in irritating opposite directions. The lack of Chas or Charity or Noah gives them privacy - a rarity in the pub.

"All right, seriously," Aaron begins, a grave seriousness to his voice. "Are ya okay? 'Cause if you're up this early, it means you probably 'aven't slept, an-"

"Aaron," Robert cuts in, adopting the most reassuring, softest tone he can muster. "I don't want to sleep my life away, okay? So, I wrenched myself out of bed - yes, it was hard, and I need another coffee or I'm going to pass out - but I... I dunno, I want to  _do_ something today."

"Like what?"

"I dunno. Go out somewhere? Not to a bar," he adds at the end when he spots the scepticism flit across the younger man's face. "Somewhere like... what about that theme park we went to last year?"

They'd had one hell of a laugh at that theme park. After all the turmoil of the trial and before the torture of the funeral, the one valuable day squeezed in between them wasn't to be wasted and drowned in self-pity; Liv's refusal to participate made the day even better (he loves her now, but god, Robert was secretly so relieved when she turned the offer down), leaving them to themselves and allowing them to ride the UK's fastest roller coaster three times in a row before winning a giant teddy bear and almost making themselves sick on blue candyfloss.

Sadly, Aaron huffs, smiling but with a furrowed brow. 

"It's pissin' it down outside," he says. Fucking Mother Nature. "And I don't think either of us fancy a day out at a freezin' cold fairground."

"Well... cinema, then?"

The younger man's face brightens a little, growing more hopeful that maybe this isn't a dream. "To see what?"

"Anything you like," Robert replies, eager to please. "There's that car chase one you wanted to see."

"You hate car chase movies."

"They're a laugh," Robert shrugs, which triggers an amused shake of Aaron's head. 

"Go on _then,_ if you're sure you're up for it."

Now he really is taking the piss, and he knows it, as the smirk on Aaron's face as he turns away betrays him. Robert smirks back. Maybe today could go well after all.

 

* * *

 

Half an hour into the movie, Robert is gasping for a drink. It claws at the back of his throat, rattles around in his brain and latches onto every nerve ending, causing him to fidget endlessly in his seat. It's all screams and explosions on the screen (two cars have already managed to collide on a highway); just blurs and streaks of colour that make up bad accents and worse acting. Still, the audience of mostly teenage boys and groups of college kids seem immersed, even entertained by the tragic waste of beautiful cars, and if it wasn't for Robert's obvious discomfort, Aaron could have made it through the film without any distractions. However, seeing Robert's leg relentlessly jiggling up and down out of the corner of his eye eventually drives him mad.

"What's up?" he whispers to his boyfriend as quietly as he can, flicking a popcorn kernel into his mouth.

Robert isn't going to tell him the truth. "Need the loo," he responds, before getting up and heading to the door without giving Aaron chance to protest.

The toilets are sterile, white and blue and blinding on Robert's sleep-deprived eyes.

He locks himself into a cubicle, takes a breath, and rummages through the pockets of his leather jacket for the wrap of plastic, and the rock that lies within.

When he returns to the cinema screen, everything's incredibly sharper. The shapes form like crystals on the screen, the edges defined and the colours vibrant - even the embers from the explosion glow like bulbs against the sculpted billows of smoke - and as he settles in his seat, Robert's heart hums rapidly against his ribcage, so hard he can almost feel it launching out of his chest. 

Aaron instinctively hands him the popcorn bag, and Robert hopes that the shadows of the cinema hide his blown-out pupils.

 

* * *

 

 _Fun fact: cocaine increases sexual desire but delays orgasm._  
_Fun fact: in occasional use, cocaine is an aphrodisiac.  
Fun fact: however, in heavy cocaine abuse, there is a massive decline in sex drive and activity._

"Fuck, you're keen," Aaron manages to breathe out between rough, wet kisses.

They're  _supposed_ to be heading for a meeting today, down in Leeds to discuss some expansion for the scrapyard, and things were sailing smoothly as Aaron raided Robert's drawer for a decent tie. The thin blue one he'd selected, the one that reeked of expense, was busy being knotted around his neck by Robert's nimble fingers - before almost immediately being torn off again.

They've not fucked in a while - too long for Robert. 

"There you are," Aaron had sighed in relief when his boyfriend had arrived in the Portacabin, already decked out in _that_ maroon suit with the tie swinging from his hand. "We 'aven't got long."

"Relax," Robert chuckled, shamelessly letting his eyes wonder over Aaron who would look almost flawless if it wasn't for the skewiff shirt collar and jagged cuffs. "We've got plenty of time. Where's Adam?"

"On his lunch break." 

Robert grinned to himself, locks the Portacabin door behind them (they've learned since the whole Paddy incident) and approached the younger man to help with his tie.

Now the tie is hanging limp over the back of the swivel chair and the tail of Robert's shirt has been yanked from his trousers and Robert's reddened lips are tracing patterns down the crook of Aaron's neck.

"Careful, ya don't want stubble rash all over ya for this meeting," Aaron says - like that's ever stopped them before - and his words cut off with a moan as Robert's tongue reaches a particularly erogenous spot. "Seriously, come on, we gotta go."

"We've got ages," Robert protests, and when his hand settles on the side of Aaron's face, cupping his cheek the same way they always have, ever since the first kiss, his boyfriend melts against his touch like snow in the sun.

They're seven minutes late to the meeting, and Aaron has to fix his shirt buttons in the toilets. They sit beside each other, a picture of touching knees and bitten-back laughter. 

Robert's pupils go unnoticed.

 

* * *

"Mum, I think he's getting better."

Aaron's perched on one side of the bar, lazily sipping from a pint whilst his mum darts around the other side, collecting empty glasses and filling the till. The conversation wasn't supposed to be on the topic of Robert - in fact, it began with Aaron discussing his little sister's antics at school, and the appearance of the unusually-perky older man sparked a look between Chas and Aaron that spoke volumes.

"Hmm," she nods. Scepticism is an emotion that accompanies Robert like baggage. "What have you said that's made him all bright eyed and bushy tailed?"

Aaron doesn't answer. There's things you don't really want to discuss with your mother - or anyone.

"He's come off the drink pretty quickly, hasn't he?" she continues, forehead furrowing.

"Maybe he's just come to his senses," he offers with a shrug. 

"Hmm," she repeats, watching her son-in-law disappear through the doors to the toilets. "It's a bit of a 180, though, in't it? Keep an eye on him, love."

"Always do," he says, necking his pint. 

In the locked cubicle, Robert's on his knees (not the first time), scraping the powder into a straight line with his credit card before dragging his nose across and taking it all in. It doesn't burn any more.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I really hope my internet history never gets looked at because I really don't want to have to explain why I'm googling the effects of alcohol and heroin mixed together.


	8. Cocaine (III)

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> It's when Vic is pouring her heart out to him at home, snuggled into him on the sofa with her hands wrapped around a mug of coffee and the tear tracks having hardened to marble on her cheeks, that he puts two and two together and comes closer to four than anyone else seems to have done so far.

It's Charity who confronts him first.

It's been two weeks since he last had any coke in his system. He's dropped about a stone in weight since then. His shirts hang loosely from his shoulders.

People have started to whisper about him in the pub; he hears them all around him, sees lips against ears out of the corner of his eyes. Some don't even bother hiding it - Dan and Kerry exchange their theories like everyday conversation, loud enough for him and the rest of the pub to overhear. 

("Do ya think he's ill?"

"It's probably livin' with Aaron's little sister that's done 'im in, poor bloke."

"He looks like he needs a decent meal inside him."

"'e's shacked up with the Dingles, lack of food can't be a problem.")

Aaron quickly gets tired of it, snaps at them to shut up and keep their beaks out of his business. Robert just keeps his eyes on his pint and grinds his teeth, feeling the muscles in his arm spasm beneath his shirt sleeve; he can also feel Charity watching him like a hawk.

When he gets up to go to the bathroom, he's unaware that he's being followed. In fact, he has no idea until his pupils blow out and he steps out the cubicle to be met with a thunderous face of the barmaid, glaring at him like he's just run somebody over.

"You know, I'm sure a load of people have done drugs in that cubicle, but I didn't think you would be one of them."

Robert feels his blood turn to ice in his veins.

"What are you on about?" he says, making his way over to the sink and needlessly washing his hands.

"You must think I'm an idiot," she groans, rolling her eyes. "And I'm sure Aaron doesn't appreciate being taken for a moron, either."

"Charity, what are you even doing in here?" His heightened senses amplify her voice, making it ten times as cutting as usual. 

"Fine, fine," she snaps, folding her arms across her chest. "I'm trying to help you here. That's rare for me as well, so you should be snapping my hand off."

"Help me?" he continues, playing dumb because hell, even back when he was a heroin addict he wasn't  _this_ transparent. Charity must be experienced in this.

"Your sister might be in denial, and Aaron, but you can't think that you're fooling me. Or Chas."

The idea that Chas has cottoned on fills Robert with even more dread - he can already imagine her feeding Aaron with her conspiracies, telling him that his boyfriend's a drug addict, that he should dump him before he becomes too much of a burden. He's always known Chas hated him, that she'd take any opportunity to purge her home of him and now she has some tiny thread to cling to, she can unthread everything, and-

_Stop it. You're being paranoid._

"How about you keep your nose out of our business?" Robert says, feeling his jaw tighten as he speaks. 

Charity shuts up. He's surprised that it works.

 

* * *

 

It's Victoria that susses something's up next.

She's had her concerns for months, of course - as has most of Robert's inner circle of loved ones - but voicing them has been met with her brother's reluctance to talk, followed by a blatant disregard of the situation because  _there's nothing wrong with him_. 

"Rob," she starts one day, sidling up to him with her doe eyes and a voice that practically screams that she wants something. He rolls his eyes, but looks down at his little sister, heartstrings aching. "Me van's broke down. Could you have a look at it for us?"

"Aaron's the mechanic," he replies, taking a swallow of his pint. His hand begins to spasm again in withdrawal, causing the liquid to tremble in the glass. She spots it, and her brow furrows into a trough. 

"Yeah, but I'm asking you." She sounds whiny, and it drives Robert's raw brain up the wall.

Still, his heart isn't stone enough to refuse his kid sister.

"Fine," he huffs, downing the last of his pint and shrugging on his jacket. "You're lucky I love you."

When they reach the clapped-out old banger of a van, it's lost the vibrancy that it possessed when Vic first purchased it; probably wear-and-tear from the festivals they toured, being smothered by crowds of drunk and stoned people dying for food to sober them up. Some of the paint is flecking off and windows are streaked with grease, but whilst most truck wagons look like harbingers of salmonella in this state, Vic's van manages to pull it off as some sort of endearing retro image. The only thing that's disrupting the whole facade is the billows of black smoke that are pouring from the lifted bonnet, curling and dancing into the atmosphere.

"Fucking hell, Vic," Robert exclaims when he catches sight of the mess. "What did you _do_ to it?"

"I dunno!" she says, helplessly looking on at her brother's vacant expression. His eyes are bloodshot, and his veins are blue ribbons beneath his translucent skin. She gulps down her concerns and continues. "I were just driving along when it started clunking, so I pulled over, lifted the bonnet and almost suffocated on it."

"You've naused this up a bit," he chuckles, trying to examine the mauled engine, but the smoke makes it difficult. Eventually his eyes start watering, so he pulls back, burying his shaking hands into his pockets. "I haven't got any tools on me either. I really think we should call Aaron out here and let him do the job."

So they do.

Aaron pulls up to the layby in his own van, sporting a duffel bag of tools and a grouchy expression, but upon seeing his boyfriend standing upright and not healthy but awake, relief glows in his miserable frown

"Fucking hell, Vic," Aaron echoes, smelling the smoke before he sees the full extent of it. 

"Yeah, alright, no need to go on about it," she says, rolling her eyes but smiling at the sight of her brother and his boyfriend standing in the same vicinity. It's been a while. "I'm getting coffees. What d'you both want?"

"Nowt for me, ta," the mechanic says, burying his head into the bonnet. 

Robert just shakes his head in reply, eyes lingering on the younger man who seems reluctant to look anywhere but the tangle of wires and tubing encased within the vehicle. A few tweaks with a spanner manages to stem the smoke, leaving black dust hovering in a cloud around them.

"So, er, what's causing it?" he asks, leaning his shoulder against the serving hatch, watching his boyfriend get to work. 

"Burning oil," is the short, half-arsed reply he gets back.

"Is it dangerous?"

"Would be if she'd kept driving."

"Anything I can do to help?"

"Nope."

The atmosphere stays palpable between them, locked in both a desire and a reluctance to talk, to make the first move; neither of them have the guts to. There's hours of conversation that they've refused to exchange, so many issues Aaron wants to address and to grill the older man on - the primary one being what the fuck is going on with him, and why he's not eating or sleeping or acknowledging that something is clearly wrong - but he bites his tongue in knowledge of what reply he'll receive. He'll be shut down, ignored. Maybe this is payback. Aaron's been cold to Robert enough times before, dodged his attempts to probe about his well-being - maybe this is karma.

Victoria returns with one cardboard cup, blowing into it to cool the beverage inside, and her face falls at the visible tension she walks into.

"Any idea what it is?" she questions, voice perky.

"Your 'ead gasket's sprung a leak and the oil's burning, which is why there's all this black smoke," he replies, considerably longer and more interested than his exchange with Robert. 

Robert notices. It cuts him up a little.

"Easy to fix?"

"It'll cost an arm and a leg, Vic," he replies with a slight grimace. "Ya might be better off gettin' a new van."

She lets out a long, frustrated groan and slumps against the van, eyes dropping to the concrete of the layby, and Robert exchanges a brief look with Aaron, both their eyes filled with matching concern. When she starts crying, Robert is instantly by her side."

"Hey, don't worry," he says as soothing as he can, wrapping a long arm around her skinny shoulders and pulling her into him; she shifts uncomfortably as she feels the shallow valleys between his ribs. They used to fit together perfectly, like two jigsaw pieces, but now Robert can feel her straining away to avoid the hills poking out from beneath his skin. "We can get you another van."

"I don't care about the flamin' van!" she professes, throat thick with emotion and eyes glistening in the dim sun with welled-up tears, before pulling away from her brother and storming off down the road. Her childish stomp brings the image of petulance, but both of the men can tell that there's something beneath the surface. Aaron knows what it is. Robert is as oblivious as always.

"You gonna go after 'er or what?" 

He would, if there weren't withdrawal chills running up and down his spine. 

 

* * *

Adam cottons on next.

Adam, the brother-in-law with the junkie sister. Adam, the best mate of Robert's boyfriend. Adam, who probably should have realised a lot earlier than he does.

It's when Vic is pouring her heart out to him at home, snuggled into him on the sofa with her hands wrapped around a mug of coffee and the tear tracks having hardened to marble on her cheeks, that he puts two and two together and comes closer to four than anyone else seems to have done so far.

Even _he_ struggles to see the golden boy as a druggie - this man was living _la dolce vita_ in Home Farm once upon a time with all the money in the world nestled in his back pocket, yet he was as sober as a judge - but honestly, when he catches sight of Robert in the pub with his hollow cheeks and ash-coloured skin, the whole prospect becomes a little less unbelievable.

_Robert Sugden on drugs. Fucking hell. It's like seeing Brenda in a red light district._

Robert doesn't drink anymore. If he hovers at the bar for long enough to down anything, it's usually just water, or orange juice if he's feeling adventurous. The powder he's been blowing up his nose has numbed his tastebuds to the point where food turns to glue between his teeth, and any sort of flavoured liquid turns to piss. No wonder he doesn't eat any more. There's no fucking point.

They're sat in the booth, Aaron and Robert, sat at opposite ends of the seats when Adam nabs the seat opposite them, regarding the pair with cautious eyes.

"Alright, lads?" he tries, eliciting a grunt from Aaron and no reaction whatsoever from Robert, whose eyes seem to be wandering the room. "You, er... you doin' alright, Robert?"

"Why does everyone keep asking that?" is the unexpectedly hostile reply that makes both of them jump. Aaron looks over like a startled animal, on tenterhooks, awaiting the next words.

"Because, to put it lightly, mate, you look like shit." It's probably not the best reply to make, even for someone trying to interject some humour into the situation, but Adam's trying. Unfortunately, Robert doesn't see the funny side.

"Do I insult you every time you have an off day?" 

Yeah, he does, really, but it's only jokingly. Adam's about to reply with that, but the stony expression on Aaron's face tells him that any and all chance for humour has drained from this conversation. "You call this an off  _day_?"

"Fuck you."

"No, Robert, wai-" Aaron reaches up to try and grab his boyfriend back, pull him back down to sit, but it's too late - Robert's disappeared out of the doors of the Woolpack, teeth grinding in anger. "What'd you have to do that for, ya idiot?"

"Aaron-"

"Ya really think insulting 'im is gonna make things any better? I can 'ardly get two words out of 'im and yet all people seem to do is take the p-"

" _Aaron_."

"He's  _ill_ , Adam. And 'e won't tell me what's up with 'im, and it's driving me round the fuckin' bend-"

"He sounds like Holly."

He only says it quietly, under his breath with a gruff tone, but Aaron's ears pick up on it and his forehead deepens. 

"What's that supposed to mean?"

"Nothing. Nothing, mate, ignore me."

They share a drink, two drinks, three, until Victoria joins them and they talk about the van incident, leaving Robert's name out of it entirely because hours after the day has finished, whilst Aaron's lying in an empty bed and Robert's on his knees in some dingy pub, satisfying his habits with a line or three of cheap drugs, Adam's words roll around like dead weights in his head.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> If there's any faults with the mechanical stuff, I was relying on Yahoo Answers, so apologies if it's completely inaccurate. 
> 
> Another short one, I'm afraid. The next chapter is where Robert will really sink to his lowest points.


	9. Cocaine (IV)

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> "Y'know, there're days when I wake up and I think, for a split-second, that 'e's dead. I 'ave to check that 'e's still _breathin'_ some mornings. Do you know 'ow _scared_ that makes me?"

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'm so sorry that this chapter is incredibly late! Exams got on top of me once again. They're all complete now, thankfully, so hopefully updates should speed back up. Thank you to everyone who reads this fic, and has stuck with it and dealt with my terrible updating schedule - you're all incredible! x

When Robert sees himself in the bathroom mirror, even he recoils at the sight.

He doesn't look like those infamous mugshots of addicts, with patchy skin and deep-cut wrinkles, nor does he look like he's three breaths away from dying on the white tiles; he's not yet at the stage where his before-and-after shots could be pasted onto a website to scare schoolchildren away from drugs. But god, even he can see the difference now. Once, before he ever returned to the village and even before he committed himself to Chrissie, he was lying in a rickety bed in some cheap hotel room with a man whose name he never found out, sky high on speed and being called an "angel". Repeatedly, over and over, like it was the only word his one-night stand could think of, the only word that would pass his lips.  _Angel._ A Dorian Gray-esque angel. 

Now, though he doesn't look twenty years his true age, Robert can see where the drugs have drained him. The golden tone his skin used to have has faded to a pale, waxy grey, stretched thinly over protruding cheekbones and sunken, ringed eyes. Even his  _hair_ has lost its vibrancy, now looking more like tufts of straw. And his figure, well... despite the days of working out and gym sessions being behind him, he had always managed to keep a minorly-toned physique; that's gone now. Though the whispers in the pub about how skinny he's getting had gone in one ear and out the other, he can finally see what they were talking about - he's thin, thin to the point where it's both noticeable and worrying. 

He swallows down his cravings, wraps a towel around his waist and heads back into the bedroom.

Luckily Aaron is still asleep, curled up in a ball as far away from Robert's side of the bed as possible, clearly exhausted and probably hungover. With a sigh, Robert picks out a shirt and shrugs it on, noticing for the first time just how much they bury him now and how much they emphasise the colourlessness of his skin. Trapped once again in front of a mirror, this one on the front of the wardrobe, he runs his hand over the fabric and down the left side of his torso, feeling the dips between his ribs. The sleeves hang loosely around his arms and he realises that he's moved about three notches on his belt to keep his trousers on his shrinking hips.

One of the side effects of frequent cocaine use: your tastebuds get battered to shit, and eventually reach the point where they can't taste anything at all. Robert's beginning to experience that, he discovers, as he forces down a bowl of cornflakes that do nothing but hurt the inside of his mouth. Chas watches him from the other side of the table, the mug of coffee in her hands going cold, occasionally exchanging glances with Charity who darts in and stops in her place at the sight of Robert actually _eating_. It feels like it's been a long time since he last sat at the table and had a meal.

"Are you going into work today?" Chas questions him as he washes up, obviously suspicious. 

"Yeah," Robert nods.

He's going to _try_ today.

Though in the back of his mind, his experienced and educated mind, he knows today is going to be downright hell if he's going to get through it without snorting anything in the toilets, the rest of him is determined to try and be normal for the first time in months. 

When Aaron's eyes finally open, his head is pounding inside his skull from the result of last night's binge drinking. He'd stayed up with Adam, having locked themselves in the Portacabin with a full pack of beer, and grilled him on his comment about the similarities between Robert and Holly. At first, Adam had played dumb, acted like he meant nothing by it and that he didn't know what he was saying; but Aaron isn't an idiot, and as the alcohol unwound them, he managed to coax a decent response from his friend. 

The true similarities were tough to swallow, as much of a reach as it seemed. Robert, a drug addict? Sure, he's done things wrong in the past, but the idea of Robert filling his veins looks alien, unfathomable, even to the person who knows what his boyfriend is capable of. Everything they've been through, all the stress and aggravation they've caused - the trial, the arguments, Katie - Robert never looked like he does now, all sunken and pale, so he must have never approached the drugs. What could triggered it now? Nothing out of the ordinary has occurred. At least nothing that Aaron's noticed.

"Ya think he's on drugs, then?" Aaron had asked, severing the silence after five or six cans of alcohol. Adam had let out a long, uncertain sigh, chewing on his bottom lip in contemplation.

"I dunno, mate. I'm not one to judge. I'm just saying what I've seen."

That night, it was Aaron's turn to crawl in late, stinking of booze. Robert was already passed out in bed, trying to sleep away his habits.

He rolls over, surprised to not see Robert sprawled out beside him, and is even more surprised when he stumbles sleepily downstairs and is assaulted by the blaring television and his boyfriend sat at the breakfast table, nose buried in a newspaper, looking more alert and attentive than he has for the past month. He looks no healthier - his skin is still lifeless and his body still frail - but at least he seems  _fine_. Not zombie-like, not artificially hyper, just  _fine_.

"What are you doin' up? It's not even eight yet," he asks, unintentionally hostile as he fails to suppress his surprise. Robert barely reacts, however, simply bobbing his head above the pages.

"Isn't eight when normal people get up?"

"Which is why I'm askin'."

Robert chuckles, brushing the hostile atmosphere aside with a rare smile that hasn't seen the light of day for a long time; even if it is false, it's a welcome sight to Aaron.

"We've got work today, haven't we?" He glances at his watch, before snapping shut the paper and folding it, placing it aside. "Speaking of which, eat up, Adam will be wondering where we are."

Confused out of his mind, Aaron looks over to his mum for some sort of explanation. She simply mouths, " _I don't know, love,_ " back at him, before disappearing into the bar with the mug of cold coffee still in her hands.

 

* * *

 

The car ride to the Portacabin is uncomfortably silent, filled with dozens of questions that one of them doesn't want to ask and the other one doesn't particularly want to answer; it would mean admitting his concerns, and confirming that yes, things have been a bit strange for the past few... well, _months_. Aaron's spoken to everyone  _but_ Robert about the situation, which in retrospect probably wasn't the best way of approaching things - it's a way of creeping round the issue, not actually addressing it, trying to find a solution before really knowing what the problem is. He still doesn't know what the problem is, but at least he now has a few ideas.

They park, the handbrake wrench sounding final, and before Robert has a chance to get out, Aaron stops him.

"Robert, wait."

Adopting the face and attitude of a teenager who knows they're about to be lectured, Robert waits.

"Look, I-" he stutters, trying to formulate his words. "I'm not gonna pretend like things 'aven't been weird.  _You've_ been weird. I don't know why and 'onestly, I don't think you're gonna tell me, but I need to ask. What's been up with ya lately?"

It's not the most professional way of asking, but it gets the job done. Lying comes to Robert like second nature, though, and it leaps to his aid exactly when he doesn't need it.

"I couldn't tell you, Aaron. I don't know. Work just got on top of me, what with both the companies and stuff, and I..."

He rambles on, purging himself of every excuse that he's been working on ever since the pointed looks of worry began. He knows how to talk, how to talk his way out of any situation he lands himself in, use his words to his advantage; there's nothing that can save him, however, when Aaron doesn't believe a word that he's saying.

It surprises Aaron that his boyfriend hasn't twigged yet that after everything they've been through together, Robert has become transparent. 

He zones out as Robert talks, knowing that he can't and shouldn't trust a single word, and when the monologue is complete and Robert's eyes fill with the hope that his boyfriend has swallowed the lies, Aaron sighs and decides to ignore that the last two minutes happened.

"Alright, 'ow about you start telling me the truth?"

Robert's face falls, but he manages to compose himself irritatingly quickly; it grinds on Aaron that despite their new life together, despite their established relationship and talks of moving away and shared bed, his boyfriend can so easily lie to him. Still, it's not him that he's focusing on.

"I just did."

"Come on, Robert, not sleepin' doesn't do  _this_ to ya. Are ya drinkin' again?"

" _No_."

"Is- is it somethin' worse?" He swallows, takes a breath as he prepares himself for the answer he's pretty sure he knows he's about to receive. "Is it drugs?"

Robert stares, unable to speak. It would be so easy to admit it there and then. Just one word, just a short explanation, and things could start to get better; they could get him help, get him checked into rehab and examined and brought back to reality, back to health. They could talk about what's happened, what's caused it, maybe he could even admit the events of his past addiction and explain the true cause of the marks littered up and down his arm. For the first time in months, they could  _talk_ to each other, and it would be beneficial for everyone - if Aaron hasn't left him yet, he surely won't leave him through his treatment and his withdrawal. He'd be a rock, and help his boyfriend through the pain and the déjà vu.

But of course, he doesn't admit it. Instead he recoils like he's been stung, frowning in horror, in sheer disbelief at the accusation.

"Drugs? Are you _kidding_ me?"

"Robert, I'm just askin-"

"What the hell do you think I am?"

"I was talkin' to Adam and h-"

"Oh, so Adam put you up to this? How the hell is my life any of his business?"

"Well I'm sorry, but I can't fuckin' think of anything else that coulda caused this!"

"And that makes me a _junkie_? Aaron, are you fucking joking me?!"

"I'm jus' _ask_ -"

Robert opens the door and slams it forcefully behind him, shaking the body of the car as Aaron's eyes close and he slumps against the seat, defeated. As much as he'd like to believe Robert's denial, he can't - the violent outburst was all the confirmation that he needed. He watches as Robert storms into the Portacabin, visibly fuming, and tries to work out just how the fuck he's going to get them out of this one.

 

* * *

 

"How did he react, then?"

"'ow do ya think?"

"Denied it?"

"Flipped out and stormed off."

"Okay, and what do ya think?"

"What else _can_ I think?"

"You think he's takin' drugs?"

Aaron sighs, fiddling with a pen, turning it over and over on the desk as Adam looks on from his swivel chair, frowning in concern not just for his friend but for Robert, too. 

"If 'e won't admit it, what the 'ell am I supposed to do about it?" he sighs, tossing the pen away from him in frustration. "I mean, rehab won't work unless 'e wants to be there, right?"

"Mate, I could've got the complete wrong end of the stick," Adam says, quick to excuse himself in case he ends up being the catalyst for his best friend's relationship crumbling to pieces; he almost regrets even mentioning Holly's name in this whole thing, because now he knows that he'll become the source of all advice and knowledge needed for dealing with addicted loved ones - as if Holly could be considered a success. He takes a swig from his cup of tea and continues. "Maybe he's not on drugs at all. He might just not be sleeping well - you remember all that shit with the caffeine."

"Adam, 'ave you  _seen_ the state of 'im?" He  _has_ seen the state of him, and it's still shocking every time he lays eyes on Robert; the Sugdens are an attractive family, and to think that this zombie-looking thing is part of them seems ridiculous now the glow that Robert once had has faded. Again, it reminds him of Holly, of how heroin sucked away his sister's weight and colour and life - it's like watching a remake of a film.

"Y'know, there're days when I wake up and I think, for a split-second, that 'e's dead. I 'ave to check that 'e's still _breathin_ ' some mornings. Do you know 'ow _scared_ that makes me?"

Experience has taught Adam that when Aaron starts spilling his feelings like this, he's truly troubled. All he can really be is the shoulder to cry on.

"Well, if he won't admit it to himself, he isn't gonna admit it to you, mate."

"Yeah, I know that."

"Have you tried goin' through his things? Looking for drugs or money or somethin'?"

"What kind o' boyfriend does that make me, though?" Aaron grumbles. "One who can't trust 'im at all."

"Yeah, but it's not like you're bein' paranoid here, mate," Adam reasons in reply. "There's obviously somethin' up with him, and you're allowed to be worried. Maybe you should ask around, see if anyone has seen anything, like Charity, or Liv."

"Alright, Sherlock. I'll leave the detective shit to you, thanks."

They're interrupted by the latch of the Portacabin sounding and the door swinging open to reveal Robert there, looking shrivelled up and malnourished in a patterned shirt, clutching bagged sandwiches from Bob's cafe and looking like he's about to pass out from tiredness. The rings beneath his eyes are black hammocks and the bag rustles with the tremors that shake Robert's arm.

Aaron doesn't know how much of that conversation his boyfriend overheard, but he isn't going to incriminate himself by asking; instead, he thanks him for the lunch, offers him a tea and fills him in on an offer that a business partner put in yesterday - the day that Robert spent unconscious in bed, sleeping off the aftermath of a particularly soaring high. Robert looks like he doesn't take in a word of it but Aaron doesn't care. He's grateful that Robert's even talking to him after the conversation in the car.

 

* * *

 

Maybe today wasn't the right day to come into work, as Robert discovers when the scrapyard suddenly finds itself swamped in work as the clock turns forward to midday.

The phone rings incessantly, a constant irritating hum that digs into Robert's raw brain like a drill; they're all clients, all moneybags and prospects, and all of them want to speak to the most professional worker of the tiny scrapyard in north Yorkshire - and of course, no one can use words better than Robert. However, all of the days that Robert has scolded Adam for being rude to pesky customers culminate and turn on him today. Here he is, slipping in and out of concentration at his desk, with people barking into his ear about things he couldn't care less about in this moment.

He needs a quick hit. He needs it to carry on.

The withdrawal shakes make his arms and legs tremble uncontrollably. There's chills running up and down his spine, he aches all over, he can feel his insides curling up with wanting - with  _craving_. He _needs_ it.

"I'm going out," he announces when both Adam and Aaron are occupied with important clients, so they can't slam the phones down and complain. All they can do is shoot him dagger looks and exchange knowing expressions. 

A thorough rummage through his pockets reveals to Robert that not only is he completely out of coke, but his wallet is equally bare; the nearest cash machine is in town, too far to walk and there's no way in hell he's risking getting behind the wheel whilst in such a state. 

A few minutes later, after a stumble back to the pub, he finds himself in Liv's room, emptying out her money bank into his guilty, shaking hands.

 

* * *

 

It takes hours of skulking around Leeds and waiting for the sun to sink behind the skyline for the dealers to come crawling out of the woodwork and infect the nightclub scene, stuffing the young university students with enough ecstasy to keep them dancing well into the morning. Though he's ridiculously incongruous against the colourful clothing and staggering bodies of the dance floor, he _knows_ there's cocaine somewhere in this building - there's almost a queue starting to form to the bathroom, though his hopes are dashed when he realises that the room is lit with UV and if he's caught on surveillance shoving coke up his nose, the powder will glow like embers beneath the blue rays. So, defeated, he forces his way back out and into the breezy alley that wraps around the building, scratching at himself feverishly to distract himself from his fatigue.

His track marks are inflamed, protesting against the nails that dig into them. They want a different type of stimulation - the type that's thin and cylindrical and metal.

The alley houses the scum of the city, as Robert discovers when he comes across a crowd of them, all done up to the nines in tracksuits and backwards baseball caps. They're huddled together like a cluster of animals; at first it looks like they're whispering, exchanging secrets, but then Robert catches a flash of silver glinting between columns of pale skin and it becomes obvious to the former addict exactly what they're doing.

They pass the syringe around like it's nothing. Even the thickest of addicts knows that sharing needles is never the smartest idea - who knows what the fuck you could contract from them - but he can empathise, as when there's nothing but the drugs at the forefront of your mind, the concept of catching diseases is merely a minor concern.

Robert wants it.

"Oi," he says, stalking towards them, and immediately the group looks like it's about to split and scatter like insects. They're all young, hardly any of them out of their twenties, and here they are throwing their lives away. "What's in that?"

"Why do you care?" One of them replies, voice wary.

"Cause I'll pay you for it if it's what I want."

Robert's fingers shake as they reach into his back pocket and pull out the stolen notes, presenting them to the group that almost salivate at the sight of money. Who knew a teenage girl's saved-up pocket money could send a cluster of adult men into a frenzy.

"It's coke," another one pipes up. He's clearly taken a hit - his pupils are black saucers - and since he isn't passing out, Robert can tell it isn't heroin (unless it's both in that syringe, which, if that was the case, the entire group would be on the floor having violent heart attacks by now). 

"How pure?"

"Pure enough."

"Well, you're not exactly bouncing off the walls."

"Give it time, mate."

"It shouldn't need time to kick in. It should be instant."

"Alright, mate, calm down. What are you, some sort of expert?"

"Yeah, I am. Now, how much for a hit?"

The group exchange unsure looks, like they can't really believe this is happening.

"Thirty."

"Piss off. For one hit?"

"Twenty."

"Fifteen."

"Fine."

Any sane part of Robert's mind would be screaming at him to stop, to think about what he's doing, to think about his boyfriend crying himself to sleep, and Liv wondering who's raided her money box and Victoria listening to her husband's report on her brother's state and all those clients he slammed the phone down on and his poor poor heart trying to beat normally under the influence of the drugs and and and and and and-

The needle fits perfectly. His track marks sigh with content.


	10. Heroin

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> "Then why can't 'e just _stop_?"
> 
> "'Cause it's not that easy, mate."

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sorry for the wait for this chapter, but I promise it's very angsty and very dramatic and hopefully it makes up for the three weeks of no content (sorry again!). Thank you to everyone who has carried on reading - I think there's only a few chapters left in this story, so it'll be done and wrapped up soon.

The needle is a mistake.

At first, it hurts; it feels like a drinking straw being buried into his flesh, searching for a hidden vein, hands shaking with years of inexperience. His fingers struggle and tremble as they lower the plunger and unload the substance into his body. The pain sharpens even further when he withdraws the needle, the grinding of metal against skin tissue an unnatural sensation that Robert never thought he'd feel again.

But beneath the pain, it's achingly familiar. Even after six years, six long years of spotless sobriety, every single movement is fluid and confident like he's been doing it all his life. In the dusky light of the alleyway, he can single out the pinpricks in his forearms like flea bites, and the needle settles comfortably into the largest hole and burrows a direct tunnel straight into his vein. Despite years of being left alone, there's no resistance to the metal - his body accepts it with an exasperated sigh and opens up, the once-miniature holes now feeling like chasms.

Any and all potential dangers in this situation - and there are a hell of a lot of them - disappear from his mind as soon as the cocaine hits up. All the consequences of sharing needles and shooting up and taking drugs in the first place that were fed to him at rehab, they're all gone, replaced with the concoction that gets to work quicker than Robert remembers it used to. Almost as soon as he's taken the needle out and slapped it back into the hand of the wide-eyed teenager, he can feel it starting to stir his mind.

But it feels different. It feels  _weak_.

Honestly, he should know better. Not even experience but common sense tells him that the more a drug is ingested, the stronger a resistance is developed against it. The high is no longer as soaring, the come-down now more violent, and as satisfying as it is to feel a needle after so long, his teeth grind with frustration as the coke rushes to his brain. 

"You never saw me," he spits out before shoving his hands into his pockets and walking away, riding out the high for as long as he can.

The true consequences of his actions don't really dawn on Robert until long afterwards, when he's crawled back to the Woolpack as the sun begins to slowly crawl back up over the hills. The come-down drains him, more intensely than any other has before, and the plush sheets of his and Aaron's bed are welcome arms for his tired body. He's realised over the years that the classic symptoms of come-down are virtually indistinctive from the flu - a fuzzy head, a runny nose and more joint pain than old Sandy in the pub - so nothing is more appealing to him right now than a comfy bed and fourteen straight hours of unconsciousness.  

The realisation of what he's just done strike his mind just before his body gives in and he falls asleep. It's almost instant, as soon as his head hits the pillow. 

He doesn't concentrate for long enough to feel the bed slowly rock with Aaron's silent, choked-back sobs. 

 

* * *

 

Over the breakfast table, the atmosphere is palpable. The combined smells of frying bacon and strong coffee make him nauseous, but Robert sits at the table and forces down two slices of buttered toast, the taste barely registering anymore. The only thing on his mind is water - he downs three pints of the stuff to try and quench the symptoms, and when Chas picks up on them, he's luckily able to bend things.

"I must be coming down with something," he says, sniffing as he picks at the uneaten crusts on the plate. Liv lingers near the door, her eyes glued to her phone but her ears perked. 

Aaron's sat opposite him at the table, unable to look Robert in the eye with a mixture of hatred, embarrassment and simple sadness. Their car conversation is ringing in his ears like a bell; the accusations that he threw around, the look of betrayal in his boyfriend's eyes, the immediate regret of mentioning it and the crushing knowledge that, no matter how much Robert protests, Aaron knows that he's right. He knows Robert. He knows how to read him, and he knows what he's capable of.

He just can't piece anything together. Whilst the image of Robert pushing things into his veins is completely alien to Aaron, the shock of the whole thing has worn off and now he doesn't have as much trouble imagining it. Honestly, it doesn't seem so surprising, now that he's slept on the matter; they've had their deep conversations before - usually in bed or on the couch, post-coital and basking in the dim light, physically drained and emotionally charged - and opened up to each other in every sense of the words, but even Aaron knows that Robert has his limits. Their promise to be one-hundred-percent honest with each other was a difficult task, and one that both have faltered on multiple times before; human nature doesn't allow it. They both have things to hide, things that even _they_ don't trust each other yet enough to say, things their subconscious refuses to let them share - the bottom of the barrel stuff that people go to their graves with.

Aaron loves him. He loves him so much. And watching Robert slowly implode on himself is more painful than most things he's ever experienced. He _can't_ leave him now - even if he was selfish enough to do so, he's in way too deep to pack up and move on now - and he doesn't _want_ to. Honestly, leaving Robert to deal with this by himself is the most unappealing solution to all of this, because it wouldn't make things easier, despite what Liv parrots to him in the car on the way to school.

Even his mum is trying to tell him that maybe now it's time to "think about yourself", and accept that "Robert obviously doesn't want anyone to help him". It takes every ounce of energy to prevent himself from yelling back in her face about when Gordon came back, and how Robert was the only one who tried to push through the bubble that Aaron created around himself.

He'd be dead right now if it wasn't for Robert.

He'd be rotting in the ground, his blood toxic with infection and his body cut to shreds. Every time he feels Robert crawl into bed at one a.m., he reminds himself of that. Every time Liv turns the air blue as she muddies Robert's name, he reminds himself of that. 

 

* * *

 

The day at the scrapyard is pure torture. Robert's supposed to be driving to meet a client, but he manages to convince Jimmy to do it as he knows that trying to keep his concentration whilst his brain seemingly tears itself apart would be impossible (even so, spending a few days out cold in hospital having morphine shoved through his system feels like it would be a welcome relief at this point).

His track marks are hungry; it had been so long since they'd felt anything, last night's injection was exactly what they'd been craving. They're no longer colourless, instead blushing red beneath his shirt sleeve, looking more active than they have in years, and Robert does his best to occupy himself with  _anything_ to try and distract himself from the constant burning.

Aaron spotted them ages ago.

The whole 'chicken pox scars' explanation feels like a slap in the face now. His ignorance, his gullibility, his mere acceptance that they were something so harmless drives him up the wall every time he spots Robert mindlessly scratching away at his forearm (a habit he was convinced had been broken months ago). Adam tries to excuse it, says that Aaron had no reason to even consider drugs, but it does nothing to lull his anger. He's Robert's  _boyfriend_. He should be able to sense these things. Or, in brighter circumstances, Robert should have  _told_ him.

"D'you think he's been doin' it a long time?" Aaron asks his mate when Robert nips out to grab lunch for them all.

"What? Drugs?" It seems to be the only thing they talk about nowadays.

"Yeah. Like, if those marks on 'is arms were track marks-" he has to swallow before he continues, it's still rough to talk about. "That means 'e used to do it before. D'you think 'e ever stopped?"

"Mate, I think he's jus' started again," Adam says in some sort of attempt to reassure. "I mean, he definitely didn't look like _that_ six months ago, did he?"

Aaron swigs from a can of Coke and rubs his forehead. 

"Look, mate," Adam tries again, leaning forward in his swivel chair. "If he's been on this stuff before, he's come off it before. Holly got clean, remember?"

The image of Holly, all haggard and gaunt and sweating and pounding at the door to be let out of her cold-turkey chamber, is pleasant for neither of them, especially Adam; whilst it brings back nothing but bad memories for Adam, it provides a ghastly reminder for Aaron of what his boyfriend could end up like if he continues down the route he's taking now. He isn't sure he'd be able to listen to Robert locked in a room and in pain.

"I jus'... I dunno what to do," Aaron lets out an exasperated sigh, repeating the phrase he feels like he's said a million times since this whole drugs business started, and all Adam can offer him is a sympathetic pat on the shoulder. 

"You'll probably find he _wants_ to get clean. I mean, he has you, and Liv - you're practically a little family now. You're movin' in together soon, and Christmas is comin' up. A drug addiction's probably the last thing he needs right now."

"Then why can't 'e just  _stop_?"

"'Cause it's not that easy, mate."

The idea of Christmas has seldom crossed Aaron's mind in the past few weeks, despite the countdown since mid-November that's been stuck up in glittery numbers on the pub wall. It's barely approaching December, and the only indication of Winter has been the plummeting temperatures that everyone in Britain is used to all year round, but the kids (and a few of the adults) are already hyped up for it. Just yesterday, Charity and Chas had to spend a good ten minutes talking Victoria out of plastering the entire bar in premature decorations, and the odd cheesy Christmas song has started to sneak its way onto the radio, but thankfully, there's still a few more weeks before the country plunges into festive chaos.

Just the image of Robert, drugged and scrawny and unattentive on Christmas morning, is painful to think about. It isn't particularly Aaron's favourite time of the year - bad music and way too many people crammed into Wishing Well Cottage - but the idea of spending it with his little sister and his boyfriend was always something to look forward to.

"'e has to get better by Christmas. _Has_ to."

"For himself, or for you?" 

It seems almost challenging, and Aaron immediately feels himself getting defensive.

"What's that supposed to mean?"

"Look, if Holly's taught me anything," Adam begins, taking a sip of tea that's grown lukewarm with negligence. "It's that if he doesn't want to get better, he isn't going to. You can't force him into anything, mate - and just going on at him about it won't do nothing. If anything, it'll just push him further away."

It's rare for Adam to be the one talking sense.

"Then what am I supposed to do?" It feels like they have this conversation every day, and it always ends with Aaron feeling the emotion creeping up into his throat and welling up in his eyes. "'m sick of goin' in circles."

"You're just gonna have to talk to him."

"I've tried that, 'aven't I?"

"Well, try to be less..."

"Less _what_?"

"I dunno... less _hostile_? You probably caught him on a bad day - well, in a bad mood - and maybe if you just sit him down and-"

"What, force 'im to talk? That'll go well."

"Not force, just... make it clear you're not gonna go off on one, y'know?"

It's not like he can promise it, but Aaron nods. Anything for this. Anything for Robert.

 

* * *

 

Though his absence at the dinner table is to be expected nowadays, the lack of Robert still has Aaron's heart pounding with worry, especially now his imagination plagues him with pictures of Robert in an alleyway somewhere, paying for powder and shoving it up his veins; there's no tension anymore, not now Chas and Liv no longer expect him to turn up, but when Aaron spends fifteen minutes picking aimlessly at the contents of his plate, they're both quick to address it.

"Liv," Chas begins, wanting to confront her son on the issue before his sister does. "Be an angel and go and pick us up some milk from David's, will ya?"

She burrows into her pocket for some loose change and hands it over to Liv, who isn't appreciative of being hurried out of the way but upon seeing the obvious discomfort on her brother's face, restrains from making comments and heads out the door.

"So... no Robert, then?"

It's almost a dig at this point. Aaron glares at his mum, unimpressed, and she quickly caves. "Where is he this time?"

"You think I'd be 'ere if I knew?"

"Well, ya have been every other time. Honestly, son, it looks to me like you're givin' up-" She's cut off by the look of offence that's received. "Well, I don't get it! This time last year you'd have chucked him ages ago, over something way smaller, but now you're running round after him like _you're_ the one in the wrong. Have you two had a falling-out, and you're both just being children? Or has Robert actually done something bad this time? 'Cause I swear to god, if he's done anything to hurt you, I'm gonna-"

"He's on drugs, mum."

The sentence falls like a weight; lifting from Aaron's shoulders and landing squarely onto Chas. The silence that follows is biting.

" _What_?"

"'e's on drugs. 'e has been for months."

The image is just as unfathomable to her as it is for everyone.

"Well... what kind of drugs?"

"Oh, mum, does it matter?"

"Yes!" she snaps, the hidden fragments of motherly love she possesses for Robert (they're in there, somewhere) rising to the surface in concern; she'd deny it if you asked, but Chas has caught the moments in the midst of a crowded bar, a family gathering, even at the scrapyard, where her son and Robert exchange a glance or a smile and she can practically _feel_ the love between them. Even if most days she just tolerates her son-in-law, part of her has grown to accept and appreciate him, so despite most of her fears being more for Aaron, Robert's wellbeing is a worry of hers. "How d'you know? Has he admitted it? Did he tell you?"

"No," Aaron replies, perched on the edge of the couch, wishing he could be anywhere instead of here. "It was... it was Adam who first suggested it. So I asked Robert about it, and of course 'e denied it but I could tell he were lying."

"Right," Chas nods, struggling to process it all. "Aaron... you've gotta get him help."

"D'you think I don't know that?"

"I know, sweetheart, but you've gotta get him into a clinic before he does something stupid."

"What, before he tops himself, you mean?" Aaron spits, channelling every urge to cry into anger; he's been bottling it up for days and he needs to spit it out. Chas flinches at the mention of it - it's a raw topic between her and her son. "Mum, if 'e's not admitting it, 'e's 'ardly gonna want to go to rehab anytime soon."

"Then _make_ him admit it!" She sounds like a whiny toddler, petulant and desperate, but it's clear that she's terrified. "Because I am not having him make your and Liv's lives a misery, not again!"

"Make _my_ life a misery? Mum, 'e's taking drugs, I doubt 'e's in a good place 'imself!"

"He's being selfish," she says, adamant, and Aaron feels his blood boil. "He is, he's being selfish. He's got _everything_ in front of him and he decides a drug habit is the best course of action."

"Were you sayin' the same when I was in 'ospital?" He stands up, the anger shaping every muscle in his body, fuelled entirely by the need to defend Robert. He thought the age of all the bitter comments and insults from his mother were long over. "I was ready to give up, were you callin' me selfish? Saying I 'ad it all comin'?" 

Chas doesn't reply.

"Exactly."

"Aaron," she says after a brief, tense silence, voice softer and more carefully treading. The panic has ebbed away, replaced with the authoritative, advisory motherly tone that Aaron has been needing more than he can really admit. "You need to talk to him. Don't pounce on him and scare him off, actually talk to him. There's no way he's going to get better if he's in denial, and we don't the worst happening, do we?"

Feeling hot tears begin to prick his eyes, Aaron shakes his head.

"Does Vic know?"

"I think she's sussed that somethin's up, but..." he trails off, and Chas gets the drift of it.

"Well, do you want to tell her or should I?"

"I'll do it," he says. Aaron's always felt a sense of responsibility when it comes to Victoria. "And Diane. Maybe I can get 'em all to sit down together and- maybe not."

"Yeah, the Sugdens aren't really renowned for getting along, are they?" It's a throwaway comment, but for some reason, it infuriates Aaron even more. "I just don't get it. Robert? On drugs? Businessman Robert, with his fancy shirts and his... smug grins and his..."

"I know." Aaron sighs, his head falling into his hands. "It doesn't make sense." 

The moment is broken by the sound of the door clattering open, followed by it shutting clumsily, making both Aaron and Chas jump out of their skins. Immediately both of their minds wander to the same thing, and a fleeting look of terror between them is the only time they get before the incessant thump of uncoordinated footsteps tumbles down the hallway. 

"Robert?" 

When Robert walks into the living room - well, 'walks'. It's more of a fall - Aaron can hardly believe his eyes. 

He's barely conscious, his eyes closing and his feet dragging across the carpet as he blindly navigates his way to the sofa, clearly fighting to stay awake and functioning as the drugs try to pull him under. His limbs are like jelly, his muscles useless, and as Robert collapses onto the couch and deflates with a sigh, his mind almost visibly slows in his skull. 

Instantly, Aaron is on his knees at the foot of the couch, grasping his boyfriend by the shoulders and shaking him awake.

"Robert? _Robert_!" The tears fall, thick and fast down his cheeks. "Robert, what did you _take_?"

He doesn't need an answer - the symptoms are text-book.

Admist all the chaos, a mixture of Aaron's frantic questions and Chas' leap for the phone, Robert passes out, his body floating and his track marks aflame.


	11. Sobriety (I)

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> "Listen, Liv," he begins. "I know you're just a kid, an' you'll do stupid stuff all the time - skippin' school, drinkin', you'll do everythin' just like I did - but I am beggin' ya, never do anythin' like this. Don't go near the drugs. It ain't worth it."

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Another almost-month-long upload break. Sorry! This one's short, more of set-up for the next chapter, which might also be a bit slow because anyone who follows me on Tumblr will see that my laptop screen has been obliterated... yeah, the universe is working against me right now. :/
> 
> Thank you to everyone that is still reading, and putting up with the awful gaps in uploads!

"Sit down, love," his mother says, tired crows feet branching out from the corners of her eyes. "You're wearin' the floor out."

Aaron doesn't reply, instead keeps his eyes on the flecks of green and blue in the flooring and continues to pace in circles. His bottom lip takes the brunt of his anxiety, bitten to shreds by his teeth, but he can feel his fingernails digging crescents into the flesh of his palm. The pain, he tells himself, is a distraction - anything to take his mind off of what's happening - but Aaron's hyper-aware of every beep of a pager and swing of a door. 

Everywhere he looks, despite the brightness of the interiors, death and illness stares him in the face; that's pretty much what a hospital is, just a culmination of everything that could go wrong in a person's life. He's spent too many of his days here, either in a bed or lingering in a waiting room, and this isn't the first time he's been here for Robert. Of course, the circumstances were different. 

Of course, the circumstances were a bit different last time. 

There are leaflets and information flyers pinned up all over the walls like posters in a teenager's bedroom, hostile and scaremongering with all sorts of angry slogans -  _Had a Cough For More than Three Weeks?, The Truth about HIV, Cancer: the Symptoms._ Chas has her nose buried in one boasting a giant needle on the cover, and by the grimace on her face, god knows what sort of grotesque images they've printed onto it.

"Have you called Vic and Diane?"

He has, and it had been nothing but choked sobs and Victoria's concerned demands to know what was going on, to which Aaron had managed to finally reveal that her brother was once again lying in a hospital bed, being pumped full of chemicals to try and stir him awake. He'd been unable to say  _why_ he was here. Instead, he'd just begged them to get here as fast as their car could carry them.

It's noisy, too noisy - another reason why Aaron despises hospitals - and the waiting room is packed to the brim with all sorts of characters: an excited father-to-be, tapping furiously at his phone; a family of four or five crammed into the corner, flicking through magazines as their kids mess with the water cooler; a teenage girl with an ugly gash carved into her forehead, clearly in pain but with no parents in sight. She looks like Liv, the girl, with fair hair and round cheeks and ripped trainers, and it only reminds Aaron that his little sister has no idea of what's been going on for the past few months. She's not blind - the once ambivalent attitude that she'd finally developed towards Robert swiftly plummetted along with his condition - but Aaron doubts that the possibility of drugs ever crossed her mind.

That had always been a main difference between him and Robert. Robert lashes out when he hurts; Aaron turns it in on himself.

"Aaron." Chas' voice cuts through his thoughts again, and when he looks up, she's gesturing to the empty chair beside her. He doesn't  _want_ to sit down - he wants to keep mobile so he at least  _feels_ like he's doing something, not just sitting and feeling his brain stir in his skull - but there's a sternness in her tone that pretty much forces him down next to her. Immediately his leg starts jiggling, tapping incessant patterns onto the floor until he feels his mother's hand take his to try to calm him down. 

"Where's all the doctors?" he grumbles, irritated at the lack of blue uniforms darting from room to room. Every time somebody comes around the corner his heart leaps, praying that it's a person who isn't as in the dark as he is (along with a sliver of hope that it might be Robert, upright and healthy), but it always turns out to be some crying visitor or discharged patient.

"They're looking after him," is Chas' reply. "They're getting all the... _stuff_ out of his system."

Even _she_  still can't bring herself to say it.

Aaron's phone starts buzzing, and a quick glance at the screen reveals a series of texts from Liv demanding to know if he's okay and if Robert's still alive; though the concern is more than likely for her brother than her step-dad, Aaron's somewhat relieved that it isn't snidey remarks being sent to him like he'd expect.

He texts back a simple  _i don't know_ , and receives no reply.

 

* * *

 

"Aaron!"

It’s obvious by their dishevelled hair and lack of makeup that Vic and Diane have hastily thrown on clothes and hot-wheeled it to the hospital, but it’s also clear their appearances are the last things on their minds. Aaron sees them first, watches them tear into the waiting room and his heart sinks to his stomach because how the hell does he explain this to them? How does he excuse his keeping it from them?

Her voice draws all eyes of the waiting room as Vic charges forward, glassy-eyed and bewildered, roughly tugging strands of hair from her face. Diane is quick to follow, struggling with her coat, and Aaron pales, eyes widening like a deer in headlights.

"What on earth’s goin’ on?" Diane demands, looking back and forth between her in-laws for some sort of response, and Chas’ frown deepens.

"You didn’t tell ‘em?!" she barks, but recoils when her son glares at her, unimpressed.

"Didn’t tell us what?"

"Listen, Vic," he begins, eyes diverting back to the flecks of colour in the floor because his throat is already starting to thicken again. "I'm sorry, alright, I should've told ya earlier-"

"Aaron, what's going on?!" It's upsetting to see Victoria cry, especially to Aaron; there's so much history threaded through them and between them, they're closer than either of them can really admit, and watching the tears start snaking their way down her cheeks is like watching his little sister. All he wants to do is hug her, comfort her and be the stronger person here, but it's impossible. His conscience won't allow it. 

"Robert, 'e... erm... look, you're probably not gonna believe it but... Robert overdosed," he says, and Vic and Diane look at him like he's just spoken fluent Swahili.

"Overdosed on what?" Diane asks, and somewhere in the background, Chas winces. They're probably expecting him to say medication, maybe those caffeine pills that Robert spent a few weeks hooked on. They seem like Smarties compared to what he's taking now.

When Aaron doesn't answer, Chas mercifully steps in.

"The doctors... the doctors said that they think it might be heroin." 

There's no bursting into further tears or anguish; instead, all that follows the revelation is silence. Pure stunned silence that hovers in the air and hangs over Aaron's shoulders like dead weight, coupled with both of his in-laws brows furrowing in further confusion because it's just as unfathomable to them as everyone else, perhaps even more so.

"What d'you mean, heroin?" Victoria persists, voice cracking on the last word, and Aaron squeezes his eyes shut, steeling every organ inside his body to stop himself from crying. 

"I dunno how long it's been goin' on for, but... yeah, it-it's heroin," he chokes out, and maybe the fact that it's coming from him acts as confirmation. From anyone else it would be a rumour, just another attempt from the village to muddy her brother's name, but to Victoria, watching the words fall from Aaron's mouth hammer it in unforgivingly. 

"No, that doesn't make sense," Diane argues, stumbling over her words. "Why would Robert ever go _near_ that stuff?! That's not like him."

Before Aaron can churn out any bullshit convoluted explanations for this, his eyes catch a flash of blue uniform passing by, and he practically leaps eagerly towards the nurse for any scrap of information that might be available. She's in a hurry, clearly rushed off her feet amongst the blur of the hospital with her hair escaping its updo and rings beneath her eyes, and there's definitely an irritated sigh when a cluster of upset patients tug her aside; still, it's her job to keep people updated. 

"Excuse me," says Aaron, the polite words not matching the urgent tone of his voice. "Erm, Robert Sugden? I brought 'im in a while ago."

"Are you all family?" she asks, looking amongst the group, and all heads (apart from Chas') nod. "We're treating Robert for diamorphine overdose. He took a substantial amount for a first-time user... unless any of you know of any history with drugs that he has?" 

Aaron swallows, and nods. "He, erm... I think 'e does."

The looks he attracts from the rest of his family are incredulous, and they burn into his skin like fire, but he clenches his jaw and keeps his eyes on the nurse, who simply nods understandingly. That's something that Aaron has always found relieving - doctors don't scowl or glare at him judgmentally like they're above him.

"We found what we believe to be intravenous drug use marks on his arms," she replies, and now all eyes flock to her. "We've given Robert a solution to stop his body from absorbing the drugs-"

"When can I see him?" Aaron interrupts, unable to listen to all the medical details when the knowledge that his boyfriend is lying half-dead in a hospital gown is thumping in his head. The nurse doesn't react - it's all part of the job - but Aaron feels his mother's hand curl around his arm, almost holding him back. 

"You can see him now, but please keep in mind that we're not sure when he will regain consciousness - it's really just a matter of waiting."

 

* * *

 

When they all pile into the hospital room, each of them freeze, breath catching in their throats.

The person in the bed before them, hooked up to all sorts of machines and being fed through a drip, isn't Robert.

Well, it is. But it's not the Robert that they know.

It's the thinnest he's ever looked, his cheekbones protruding from the sides of his face beneath grey, waxy skin and dark circles that look like paint beneath his eyes; he's almost as white as the sheets, and as the nurse reels off some medical terms and double-checks equipment readings, Aaron can do nothing but stand and stare in horror. Vic and Diane wear identical expressions, ones of sheer bewilderment, but then they get a good look at Robert and Aaron watches as Diane goes a peculiar shade of green and Victoria can hardly breathe through the sudden onslaught of tears.

"Is he- is he gonna be okay?" she manages to say, to which the nurse gives her her best sympathetic expression.

"We'll know more later. We're doing all we can to help him."

_That's a no, then._

"Listen, love," Chas interrupts before Aaron feels the hand on his arm again. "I'm gonna head home and check on Liv, let her know what's going on. Ring me if anything happens, yeah?" In a hushed voice that she thinks Aaron can't hear, she says to Vic, "Keep an eye on him."

She's quick down the corridor, also feeling the hospital walls close in on her as she walks; like her son, just the scent of the medicines and the brightness of the walls feels oppressive, uncomfortable, and as much as she wants to be there for her son, any present excuse to get out of there is one to be taken. She also doesn't particularly want to introduce Liv to the situation, seeing as the poor kid has seen her brother break down far too often for a lifetime, but her conscience knows it'd be unfair to keep her out of the loop.

On the drive home she feels ill, with her phone on full volume, both awaiting and dreading its ring.

 

* * *

 

Another hour of silence passes, one that wades through the sea of anxiety that swells and laps around the feet of the visitors. The waiting room, though just as full as before, has a whole new set of characters occupying the plastic chairs, with most of them long asleep as the late evening encroaches. Aaron's tired - usually he'd be wrapped around his boyfriend in bed by now, with Robert's arm draped over him like always - but he doesn't dare let himself nod off for fear of missing anything. The coffee machine offers energy in the form of watery espressos that taste more like bathwater, but even if they go down with a grimace, they're enough to keep Aaron balancing on the right edge of unconsciousness.

The entire hectic atmosphere of the hospital seems to have stepped up a notch in the evening, as the drunks who have fallen off the pavement and knocked out a few teeth begin stumbling in and cramping up the waiting areas, whilst the nurses look more than ready for the weekend. To the right of him, a young party-goer who stinks of booze slurs under his breath, attempting to grumble but instead muttering a string of illegible sounds. To the left, Victoria, her blonde hair tied up in a messy halo around her head and her eyes closed, having succumbed to the tiredness. Diane took off a while ago, having not wanted to spend the night in a waiting room and asking that Aaron call her if anything develops.

Liv texts again, everything from  _when r u coming home?_ to  _ur mum says that he's gonna be fine. don't worry._ He dodges her questions and tells her to go to bed.

"Robert Sugden's family?" a familiar voice approaches, and Aaron looks up to see the same nurse as before standing over him, brandishing a clipboard and a polite smile.

"Yeah," he replies, nudging Victoria awake who goes to grumble at him before seeing the nurse and bolting upright with new-found attention. 

"Is there any news?" she asks, rubbing her eyes sleepily, and the nurse once again offers them sympathetic looks (it's starting to drive Aaron up the wall).

"Robert's responded well to the treatment, and he woke up about ten minutes ago," she says, and Aaron's heart soars. Every emotion imaginable stirs, and present themselves as salty tears starting to well up, threatening to breach and run like tyre tracks down his cheeks. He wipes them away hastily, which he knows is ridiculous considering most of the people he's seen pass through the hospital today have been sobbing, but he's always been embarrassed by how easy it is to make him cry. 

Victoria catches on, seeing the reddening off his cheeks. "Can we see him?"

"You can," the nurse nods, referring down to her clipboard. "He's still very groggy, so don't overcrowd him. I'd recommend one visitor at a time, but you can both see him at the same time if you prefer."

Aaron and Vic exchange a glance that speaks volumes. Neither of them want to go in there alone.

They follow the nurse through the labyrinth of corridors, resisting the curiosity to peer into other rooms, and when they come across the secluded room with the half-closed blinds, Aaron feels his stomach drop; what if it isn't the same Robert? What if he doesn't remember what's happened?

What if that overdose wasn't an accident?

The thought vanishes when he walks in, sees his boyfriend in the bed who, whilst still gaunt and sluggish, no longer blends in with the sheets beneath him; there's a flush of colour back in his skin, the same goldish tone that he once had before the drugs and sleepless nights dampened it, along with a warm blush along his cheeks that makes him look more human than he has in a while. The oxygen mask strapped to his mouth is a little daunting, along with the tangles of wires and the IV drip embedded in his arm, but he's  _alive,_ and he's  _awake_ , and even though there's a torrent of problems that need addressing after he's released, the relief of seeing Robert in the good hands of the hospital drowns out the worries for the time being.

"Oh, Rob!" exclaims a relieved Victoria, practically diving forward and wrapping her arms around her brother. He hugs her back, lifting the arm that doesn't have tubes dug into it and gingerly holding her, his tight-lipped expression unreadable. "What were you playin' at?!"

"'m sorry," is all he manages to choke out, ashamed. The look of bemusement and pity in his sister's doe eyes looking down at him, glassy with emotion, sets a lump in his throat that he can't swallow back down. "'m sorry, Vic."

"Rob, it's not your fault," she says reassuringly, her hands lingering on Robert's shoulders as she adopts the maternal aspect that suits her so well. _Of course it's my fault._ "Just... _why_? Why _drugs_?"

"I don't know," he says, unable to look her in the eye. 

Aaron can't look him in the eye either; he's once again following the blurry patterns on the floor, praying that no tears fall though he knows that it's inevitable. He can feel Robert's eyes on him, and can practically sense the look of hurt on his face. Neither of them are looking forward to the car ride home.

"The doctor says you might've taken them before," Vic continues, not really understanding boundaries, and it's obvious that she's touched a nerve because the energy in Robert's reaction - a violent denial - says all it needs to. "Rob, Rob, I'm not havin' a go. I just... I want you to get  _help._ "

"I will, Vic," Robert says, sincerity in his tone, and Aaron glances up to catch his boyfriend's tired eyes on him. "I promise."

Feeling hot tears start to sear down his cheeks, Aaron storms out, slamming the double doors behind him. The echo of Vic's voice follows him down the corridor and into the car park.

 

* * *

 

It's gone midnight when he finally arrives back at the pub, and spends a good ten minutes biting on the sleeve of his jumper to silence his sobs. Every light is out apart from Liv's bedroom, the window dyed blue from the drawn curtains, and Aaron can tell that she's probably buzzed on caffeine to try and keep herself awake so she doesn't miss her brother coming home. 

It takes a further few minutes to let the redness run from his face, and the wind howls as he steps out into the village air. Christmas lights seem to have appeared during his hospital visit; not yet alight but prepared for the festive season to begin, and they wrap like snakes around every tree and pillar in sight, ready to transform the village into some sort of Winter wonderland. Most of this is the older generation's doing, their own way of making the kids even more hyper than the Christmas sugar does on its own, but even if Christmas isn't really Aaron's thing, he can appreciate the aesthetic part of the season.

The pub is dark, eerie almost in its emptiness, and he does his best to navigate his way around without turning on any lights as to not disturb Liv if she has finally managed to drift off to sleep. However, almost instantly after he's flopped down onto the couch in the back room, the form of his little sister, messy-haired and pyjama-clad, appears on the stairs.

"No Robert?" she asks, rubbing the sleep from her eyes, forehead dimpled in a mirror image of Aaron. "Is 'e alright, or...?"

"Yeah, 'e's... 'e's fine," he replies unconvincingly, to which Liv tugs at her bottom lip with her teeth because she has no idea how thin the ice she's walking on right now is. "'e's woken up."

"Well that's good, then, in't it?" she attempts, moving forward to sit with him, and she slots into the crook of his shoulder, pulling her legs up to her chest and nestling her head on his shoulder. "What drug were it? Your mum never said," she continues, hesitant.

"Heroin." The word rings out, still feeling awful on his tongue, and he feels Liv stiffen beside him.

She glances up to look at him, maybe to see if he's joking or not, but Aaron focuses on the glow of the streetlamps permeating the air. 

"Listen, Liv," he begins. "I know you're just a kid, an' you'll do stupid stuff all the time - skippin' school, drinkin', you'll do everythin' just like I did - but I am _beggin_ ' ya, never do anythin' like this. Don't go near the drugs. It ain't worth it."

For probably the first time in her entire life, Liv listens.


	12. Sobriety (II)

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> "I thought it would make things easier. Which is stupid, I know, I've been through it all, I've got the bloody t-shirt. But I... I don't know. I thought there would be _more_."

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I mean... these upload breaks are embarrassing. :(
> 
> I tried to do something different with this one - I absolutely love Liv (as much as I slag her off from time to time :P) and I thought that her perspective on this scenario unfolding in front of her would be interesting to explore, as there's no doubt the Dingles and the Sugdens would edge round her and leave her in the dark about stuff as serious as this, which is obviously the worst thing you can do to a kid.

"You alright?"

It's a stupid question, really. He's clearly just rolled out of bed, though Liv can tell by the folds beneath his eyes that he probably spent most of the night counting the paint streaks on the ceiling. She hasn't slept much herself. She just lay under her duvet with her headphones crammed into her ears, blasting rock music as loud as she possibly could, listening to Matt Bellamy's angsty lyrics to drown out the sounds of her brother's sobs that bled through the walls. She wishes she'd stayed on that couch all night, wrapped up in his hoodie and almost comfortable in the knowledge that at least whilst he was there, he was  _safe_ with her - not hurting himself, like people say he does. 

His scars are a mystery to her. She's heard every perspective on it apart from her brother's. Whispers in the village (or, more accurately, Gabby) tell her he does it for attention. When she asks Chas one day, she's met with tightened lips and a curt, useless reply. Once upon a time, before everything fell apart, she cornered Robert in the hallway and inquired as innocently as she could. Surprisingly, he'd not been as afraid to talk about it.

"It was your brother's way of coping," he'd said, in a level voice that reeked with compressed emotion. "It was a long time ago, Liv. Let us worry about him, eh?"

He'd tried to finish it with a smile - one that didn't reach his eyes - and for a man the village calls a liar, he'd be so transparent that she was more confused than anything. She wasn't sure what had angered her more: the fact that Robert of all people was the one she'd had to approach for truth, or the insinuation that she wasn't allowed to worry about her brother.

 _Her_ brother. Her big brother, hers and no one else's.

Now, of course, she sits at the breakfast table, nibbling on dry toast and dizzy from how fast the tables seem to have turned.

When Aaron doesn't reply, she tries again. "Hey."

The look he shoots her could sour milk, and it makes her shrink down in her seat.

"Shouldn't you be in school by now?" he grumbles, eyeing the array of food with disinterest. Liv prays that he doesn't stop eating like Robert.

"Inset day," she says, voice hollow. He doesn't have the energy to argue with her. "Is Robert coming home soon?" 

At the mention of his boyfriend's name, her brother's face darkens, eyebrows knitting together in a twisted frown like he's just tasted something bad. Whatever's running through his head right now, Liv can't tell - she's never been a mind-reader - but the lack of relief in his expression makes her stomach all queasy. She's so used to seeing him and Robert wrapped around each other on the sofa, folded awkwardly with limbs hanging over the armrests and being disgustingly coupley and cute in their own little bubble, but now she knows she's catching glimpses of something else. Some _one_ else. The Aaron from the stories that the village tells, the Aaron who she never had the chance to meet. 

"Erm- yeah, I think so." 

Liv nods, and skulks away, deciding (for the first time in her life) that she'd much rather be in school than here. She has experience with knowing when she's not wanted.

 

* * *

 

School is a haze, and by the end of the day, Liv realises that she's gone to the wrong class and is sitting through a biology lesson, learning more about homo-and-heterozygous alleles than she cares to know.

When the clock ticks to lunchtime and the class pours out into the quad, she disappears behind the bike shed with Gabby. They share a cigarette, her first in months. It burns her throat and clouds her lungs but she doesn't care. 

"Robert still in hospital?" Gabby asks, attempting to blow a smoke circle but it comes out ugly and misshapen. Liv just nods. "That sucks. It's his own fault, though. I mean, he's the one that started taking drugs, y'know?"

Liv looks down at the stick between her fingers, watches the end glow cherry red and remembers that time Robert ripped the packet from her hand. Her chest tightens, and she thrusts the cigarette back to Gabby, the cravings suddenly gone.

"I know."

 

* * *

 

When half past three comes around, she hangs around at the school gates for a few minutes, clinging on to the hope that her brother will roll up in his car with that warm smile on his face that suits him better than he'll ever know. Maybe even with Robert in the passenger seat, looking healthier and more radiant than ever (or at least alive). It's only when the crowd has dispersed and there's a concerned-looking teacher lingering near the door that she gives up and, with a sigh, catches the next bus into the village. 

The bus crawls past the fields and the hedges and drops her off right where the village transitions into the sprawling hills of the countryside, requiring her to hike in the bitter winter cold past Butler's Farm and the cemetery and the plethora of cottages, all with their own personalised names. The Woolpack creeps into view just as the sky grows grey, and its festive decorations which once cheered her up now only make her feel cold. Christmas is only round the corner, and her family is in ruins.

She walks in, bag slung carelessly over her shoulder, and Chas spots her over the bar. She looks tired.

"Afternoon, love," she tries, but Liv spots the irritated grumble, the crack in her facade. Not being wanted stings.

"Where's my brother?" she demands, and Chas' face falls.

"'e's gone out."

"Gone to get Robert?"

That name must be a jinx, as it casts the darkness across his in-law's face the same way it did Aaron's. It's a different look to the one people adopt when Liv's name is mentioned - they look irritated when they talk about her. With Robert, they look sick, tense, like a taboo has been exercised before their very eyes. For once, Liv feels almost a pang of sympathy for him - a first, considering she's spent most of her days slagging him off - though she knows that they recoil for different reasons. He's an addict. She's just annoying.

"No," Chas says, surprising Liv. "'im an' Adam 'ave somethin' big at the scrapyard. Best not disturb 'em, love." 

She translates that in her head to  _they don't want you there_. Something she has to do quite often.

"So... Robert's stayin' in hospital, then?"

Chas looks ready to bury her head into the ice bucket under the bar but instead conceals it all behind a fake smile and a nod. "Vic says that 'e's awake, but 'e needs to stay for rehab and counselling an' all that."

Liv bites the inside of her cheek and becomes aware that the nearby table has been listening intently, trying to look inconspicuous but exchanging whispers between each clink of their glasses. She turns round, cheeks red, and glares at the portly face of the man from the garage. 

"What you lookin' at?" she snaps, causing a torrent of widened eyes; not ones widened with shock or apology, but that typical sarcastic look, like her reaction is somehow uncalled for. Chas is too slow to lecture her as she storms out, behind the bar, into the back room and up to bed. The door slam sounds permanent.

Her room smells funny - it's the first thing she notices. It smells like a mixture of every smell that hangs around the pub. Marlon's dinners rising through the floorboards, that awful scented candle Charity insists on keeping, Aaron's cheap shaving cream, Robert's tangy aftershave that usually makes her mouth taste sour but now instead makes her tummy feel strange. 

Desperate to empty it all out, she wrenches the window open, not caring how freezing cold it is outside. From the room below, Mariah Carey's festive wishes sneak in.

She'd put her headphones on if she wasn't listening for the familiar sound of Robert's car pulling up.

 

* * *

 

He doesn't come home.

Aaron does, face blotchy and red with sweat and his high-vis jacket dull with dust, clearly exhausted after whatever he's been taking apart with Adam at the scrapyard. He stumbles in, forehead shiny in the light and a band of moisture soaking the collar of his shirt, and Liv practically flies downstairs when she hears the door rattle.

He looks pissed off, too tired to be truly angry but with his brow creased and hanging over his eyes. When she appears, he looks less than pleased to see her, and she can't put a finger on the source of his gritted teeth; maybe it's her unwanted appearance, maybe it's the lack of Robert with him, hugging him and asking him how work went. On the days where Robert's other company tore him away from the scrapyard, they exchanged their stories and anecdotes over dinner, gossiping like old women and leaving Liv to look between them and roll their eyes at just how childish they truly were in each other's company.  _Idiots_ , she thought everything they giggled or played footsie under the table.  _Stupid gross lovey-dovey idiots._

But now the room feels empty, despite the cluster of people standing in it.

To say he's only lived in the pub for a short time, Robert's sure as hell left his mark on everything, to the point where his absence feels alien. It's like when the science teacher that Liv secretly likes is replaced for a substitute, or when Chas isn't behind the bar. It's a kink in a chain, an empty seat in a full theatre. It just looks wrong.

After a beat of silence, Aaron gets up and makes them both a drink; he has tea, she has hot chocolate. They curl up on the sofa and, despite how rancid he smells, she's more than relieved to be so smoothly accepted into his arms. For two people who are both so used to being shoved away, it's moments like this that shine through the shitty days.

The television blares out re-runs of Jeremy Kyle, providing bland entertainment in the form of chavs arguing on a stage, and their positions over time morph until her socked feet are on his lap and his hand is drumming faint rhythms on her leg and there's a bowl of peanuts between them. Not the most nutritious of dinners, but the chef isn't here - something that they're both more than aware of.

"Are you and Robert breakin' up, then?" she asks during an advert break. He tenses up like he's just been electrocuted.

"No," he says, voice flat. "'e's just not 'ome yet."

"Then where is 'e?"

"Who knows."

Liv doesn't know.

"Is 'e still at the 'ospital?"

"No. Vic picked 'im up." That perks her ears up, and brings another wave of nausea that she blames on the peanuts.

"Then why isn't he 'ere?"

"Cause 'e obviously doesn't _want_ to be, does 'e?" he says in a voice that warns her to shut up or everything's going to crumble.

She shuts up.

 

* * *

 

"I'm goin' running," her brother announces the next morning, bundling down the stairs in sports gear with his earphones cord wrapped around his neck. She's barely awake, having been sat upright in bed until one o'clock with a pillow clutched to her chest and Twenty One Pilots screaming into her ears, but the sight of him all kitted out in Adidas is both hilarious and alarming.

"You never go running," Liv points out.

"I used to, all the time," he replies, and there's _something_ in his voice, something she can't quite identify.

"Can I come with you?" she immediately asks; as much as she hates exercise, she hates school more, and even if she has to go weaving through the creepy forest in subzero temperatures, it'll be worth it to keep him by her side. His mouth twists up in amusement and he shakes his head, gesturing towards her school bag hanging on the door.

"School. Go."

She sneers at him, playful, and brushes past the coat rack to grab her jumper. Robert's blue blazer is there, the one that Liv can tell Aaron likes because his eyes light up every time Robert wears it. She ignores it, ignores the lump it puts in her throat and carries on out the door.

 

* * *

  

The school gates are wrapped in cheap tinsel and a thick frost has coated the floor of the quad, turning it into an ice rink, and when three kids end up hospitalised after a particularly energetic snowball fight which Liv definitely was not part of whatsoever, the headmaster gives in and sends everyone home, along with a flurry of texts and calls to the parents to assure them that their children are indeed telling the truth for once about the school being closed. They sit together on the bus, Liv and Gabby, ties loosened and sharing stolen sweets.

"Imagine if all the snow made the bus break down," Gabby says, a lollipop between her teeth, staining her lips bright red. 

"Yeah, and we'd be stuck in the cold all day," Liv argues. She feels sick after eating so much sugar.

The bus takes a sharp left turn, rolls itself into the village that's stuck behind white fog and a handful of schoolchildren pile off. She says goodbye to Gabby, parts ways with her at the bus stop and takes the trek down to the pub. 

Instantly the lack of Chas behind the bar has question marks circling her head (Charity's absence is less surprising), but when she goes in the back room to investigate, she doesn't expect what she sees.

Robert's there. 

He's small and hunched in on himself. The ratty hoodie that's slumped over his shoulders emphasises just how thin he is now, though there's a hue of pink back in his cheeks and whatever they've pumped him full of in the hospital has performed some sort of voodoo to repair all the discolourations woven beneath his skin. His hair's grown, that something she notices, the blonde locks creeping over the tips of his ears, and his bottom lips are chapped to buggery. He doesn't look ill anymore, just skinny, and _sad_. The same sad that she's seen in her brother's face before.

Though his appearance is unexpected, Liv can't deny that the first thing crashing through her system is relief. Pure, sugary relief. She doesn't even  _like_ Robert that much - like Aaron once said, they tolerate each other just for him - but the fact that he's here and not in a gutter somewhere (or, as she well knows could've happened, in the cemetery) manages to undo that knot that's been taut in her stomach for days now.

Chas is there, looking stern and motherly with her hands on her hips and her expression unreadable, as is Victoria who looks much more inviting; she's perched next to her brother, head on his shoulder, eyes glassy with tears.

All three heads snap up in unison when Liv walks in. It's unbearably silent for a heartbeat or two.

"You're back," is all she manages to push out, and Robert actually  _flinches_ , making Liv almost tear up with guilt. She didn't mean any venom in that sentence. Before he has the chance to reply, Chas butts in.

"What happened to school?"

"It's shut. Too much ice on the ground."

Nobody questions it.

For someone so usually talkative, Liv's mind empties. There are a million and one questions somewhere that she wants, she  _needs_ to ask, but they all liquidise just when she needs them. So, she hangs up her bag and her jumper and heads towards the stairs, head down.

"Where's Aaron?" Robert's voice pipes up. Liv pauses.

"'e went running a while ago," she replies, and turns around in time to watch the entire room stiffen for some reason. A few glances are exchanged, ones she can't read, and it frustrates her so much that she storms her way upstairs and locks the door, awaiting the shit-show that she knows will begin when her brother gets home. From below her, words start flying across the room, mainly consisting of Chas' accusatory squawk, Victoria's soft reasoning and Robert's surprising lack of self-defence. It isn't a full-blown argument - she's sure that will come later - but it's building to some sort of crescendo when Liv spies Aaron jogging along the pavement, and her eyes widen. 

She watches him walk into the pub, hears the back door slam and shake the walls, listens to the silence that falls over every voice. There's a second of suspense, one which makes Liv hold her breath before there's a sudden flurry of voices, the loudest ones being Chas and Aaron's. Robert stays quiet.

Liv reaches for her headphones, almost deafens herself with every volume control turned up to the max and curls up under her duvet, cramming the buds deep into her ears and ignoring how much it hurts. She doesn't want to listen to this.

 

* * *

 

Maybe it dies down at some point, maybe it carries on deep into the night. She can't tell. There comes a point at about half past ten, though, when not even scratchy screamo music can block out the ferocity of the yelling from bleeding through the paper thin walls.

It's not eavesdropping, she tells herself, as she sits on the upstairs landing with her face buried into a cushion.

Vic's gone, as is Chas, leaving her brother and his crazy screwed-up boyfriend on their own.

It starts with forced, spat questions through locked teeth, that false level tone from both of them that means they're both absolutely seething. The common ones - "Where've you been?", "How are you doin'?", "What's goin' on?". Ones that Liv knows are just setting up for the real argument, the real anger that's bound to come pouring out at any minute. 

It doesn't take long.

 

* * *

 

"Y'know," Aaron begins, cheeks flushed red with both anger and upset. Liv can hear his footsteps pacing up and down the room, hands dug far enough into his pockets to hide his thumb digging itself into the meaty flesh of his hand; his boyfriend is in the same position as he was three hours ago. "I've been... _so_ fuckin' scared, Robert.  _Scared_. Every time ya came in late - on the nights where ya even came 'ome at all - stinkin' of booze, or high as a fuckin' kite. All the excuses ya came up with, as well!"

"I know."

"Why couldn't ya _talk_ to me? I mean, I thought we agreed to tell each other things!"

"I know."

"Is that all ya can say?!"

"I'm sorry."

"You're _sorry_? Well, whoop-de-fuckin'-do, that's sorted everythin' out, 'asn't it? _Why_ , Robert?"

The words shake the walls, more than likely rouse the entire village from its sleep, and Liv feels hot tears begin to well up in the whites of her ears. She shoves her face further into the fabric of the cushion, biting it to stop herself from yelling down at them to shut up or to stop herself from bursting into tears. She's not sure which one would be a worse idea.

It takes Robert a minute to reply. When he finally does, his voice is low and shaky, trembling with bitten back tears. 

"I don't know."

That's clearly not the answer any of them are expecting. Liv can practically feel Aaron rear back, watch his brow deepen in confusion, in anger, in pain. She's frustrated at his answers - after months of the loop he's kept them all in, two-word answers are nowhere near enough of an explanation - but she's not her brother, and she has inklings of rational thought somewhere up in that messy teenage brain of hers. Maybe he really doesn't know why he did it. Liv doesn't know why she trusted her dad. 

Weight shifts across the floor as Aaron sits down on the coffee table, opposite the addict. His sniffles and sobs are audible, at times he coughs as tears get caught in his throat, but he takes a few deep breaths and somehow manages to calm himself down a little. Liv listens intently, waiting for the next torrent of violence.

"Right, well," her brother begins, the words somewhat slurred like he's struggling to get them out. "What about... what about the first time?"

"The first time I took drugs?" Robert says. Liv squeezes her eyes shut.

"Is it true ya took them before? Before... before I met ya?"

"Yeah." Robert sits forward, examines his fingers and fibres of the carpet for a few seconds as he puts the fragments of his story together in his head - all the darkened moments, the forgotten memories that he's forced out, all the days he's lost due to being high or unconscious. "I don't know where to start. Erm- I mean, I experimented when I was a kid, with the... the not-so-serious stuff. The stuff everyone else was doing. Weed... ecstasy and stuff. You did that too, right?"

Liv could put money on Aaron nodding in response. He was a teenager once, too. A bad one, so people say.

"Yeah, exactly," Robert continues, almost breathless as he talks like he's trying to tell the whole story in one mouthful of air. "Well, that's all it was at the start - experimenting. I never touched anything serious 'till... 'till uni. I did a line of coke in a bathroom stall. That went on to two more, to three more, and so on and so on. It wasn't... it wasn't an addiction as such. It was just something to get me through exams. Coming off it after a while wasn't fun but it was possible, y'know? It wasn't as bad as it was this time around."

His voice goes quiet, tapers off as the final sentence ends. 

"I did all that stuff, Robert," her brother's voice almost whispers. "But smack? When the 'ell did _that_ start?"

"After my dad died." 

A weight lands on Aaron's shoulders.

"I couldn't deal with it. I've never been good with grief. I beat myself up, I make a mess, and it gave me an escape. Some mate talked me into it one night and that's how it started. Just like that."

There's a stretch of silence before Aaron speaks again. He sounds hoarse. 

"And you couldn't stop?"

"It went on for a while. Eight months, I think it was, in the end. Then I just... I came to my senses, I guess, and cut it all out. Went to rehab, went on methadone, did the whole package because there was no way in hell I was letting it kill me." Liv can't trace the emotion in his voice - he sounds like he's on auto-pilot, churning out something rehearsed, and she wonders if he has; maybe he's been practising this for months in the knowledge that he'd be found out some day. Or he'd end up topping himself.

She's being bitter again. Aaron always tells her off for it.

"Fuckin' chicken pox scars? You really said that to me with a straight face?" her brother snaps, fresh anger rising in his voice. 

"I'm not proud of that. It was just... easier than telling you the truth."

"But that makes no sense, Robert, cause didn't we _agree_ to tell each other the truth? After I almost lost ya the first time round?"

"You hated me when I got shot."

"Yeah, I did- I-I did but I _didn't_. I _didn't_. Which is why it 'urt so much. It 'urt like 'ell, you sayin' all that shit to me. Why would you ever think that was alright to say-"

"Why are you even bringing all this up?" The floorboards creak dangerously as Robert stands, and Liv's breath catches in her throat with the noise. "I thought you wanted me to tell you why I did all this."

More silence; the type with its own heartbeat, broken by the sound of grinding teeth and clenched fists. Both of them are angry, the atmosphere palpable, and Liv wouldn't be surprised if furniture starts flying any moment now.

Luckily, though, it doesn't.

There's a dull thud as Robert lands with a deflated sigh back onto the plush sofa, followed by a choked-back sob that's too high-pitched to be her brother's. She's never heard Robert cry, nor has she seen it, but it's a strange sound - it seems alien, like it doesn't quite suit the businessman with the scheming mind and the questionable moral compass. 

Then again, addiction doesn't suit him either.

"So why did you do it?" Aaron asks, and it's clear that he's crying his poor heart out right now. Robert's crying too, and Liv is almost dizzy with swallowed down tears. 

"I don't know," is the reply; the soft, gentle reply that reeks with honesty. "I don't know, okay, and that's the worst part of all this. I was too flaming  _weak_ and too flaming  _blind_ to know a good thing when I saw it. I mean, the work and the caffeine... that was just so I keep on top of everything. I couldn't let the scrapyard go under - it's _your_ business, I couldn't be the one responsible for it going under, right? But when I saw the books and I saw it was a dry spell, I panicked, and I'm such a bloody perfectionist, I couldn't just let it go and wait for business to pick back up - I had to interfere. The drinking... I couldn't sleep without the pills so I needed to find some other way to knock me out. I wasn't going back to heroin - well, I wasn't _then_. The coke woke me back up. It was just a vicious cycle, Aaron, and I got stuck."

"But... _why_?" Aaron persists, and everyone understands what he means. "I mean... were ya not 'appy with me? Was it all the stuff from the trial or... was it me, or-"

"No. No, no, oh God, no, it wasn't you." Robert's quick, like he's rushing to patch up a wound. "To be honest, you were my rock. I was expecting you to leave me at any moment. God knows what I'd have done if you had. But that's what confused me. Last time I had a reason. The last time I ever saw my dad, he shoved me in a car and told me to go away and never come back. Andy killed- _Andy killed mum_ , but he sends _me_ away?"

His voice cuts off with a long, agonising sigh through swollen lungs, and for a few seconds, there's nothing but the sound of burning hot tears emanating from the lounge. The pillow on Liv's lap is soaked through with salt.

"And then he goes and dies. Some illness he never told us about, and it made him have a massive heart attack, and I was such a bratty little kid that I never once went back and patched things up with him. I had every chance to, I had  _years_ , but I never did. And I'm never going to be able to take all that back."

Aaron feels his heart sink in his chest; they've spoken about all of this before, several times over, they've told each other secrets and tales about their past that no one else knows, but the gravity of this situation has never quite landed on Aaron before like it has now. Watching his boyfriend, his beautiful, beautiful boyfriend in front of him, gaunt and ill and sobbing with the voice of someone who's just _too_ used to being unwanted... it's more painful than he can say.

"So... the drugs are from that? It's somethin' from your past that's come back to bite ya?" Aaron attempts, trying to piece everything together in his head and still missing some vital pieces. 

"It was literally a downward spiral. I needed something to get me on top of everything, and it got out of control."

"You thought it would help?"

"I thought it would make things easier. Which is stupid, I know, I've been through it all, I've got the bloody t-shirt. But I... I don't know. I thought there would be  _more_."

More what? Who knows. More life, more from the high, more of a point - Aaron doesn't know. All he knows is that his boyfriend, his beautiful, beautiful boyfriend is in front of him, green with sickness and eyes puffy with the voice of someone who's just _too_ used to being unwanted. The gravity of the situation has never really landed with him before; they've told each other so many things, so many private tales and stories from their past, things not even their close families know. He's heard the story of Max's death, of that game of chicken on the country road that sent Robert away, but he's never really grasped just how much it affected Robert. Seeing him now, though, it hits him like a ton of bricks. 

There's a squeak and a sigh as Robert leans forward, the cushions folding and bending beneath his weight (or lack of). "But Aaron, I am so, _so sorry_. I've made your and Liv's lives a misery these past few months and I've got no excuse. I can't believe you haven't completely sacked me off already-"

"Wait, what?"

"All the stuff I've said to you... everything I've _done_ to you... you'd be so much better off without me." It's not even the pathetic, whimpering self-pity that Liv's grown accustomed to hearing him adopt through the walls after one of their infamous arguments; there's a true sadness to his voice, one that Liv's only ever heard from her brother. There's a scratch of his crinkly coat against the coffee table as Aaron stands, stalking over to Robert and Liv holds her breath, chest filled with dread that she's about to witness her brother's relationship crumble even more than it already has. 

"Robert. Rob, Robert, look at me." There's a pause as tears snake their way down Robert's cheeks. "Do ya really believe that? Because it's bullshit. I would be  _dead_ if it weren't for you, Robert. Ya think I'd have gotten my dad to trial without ya? Ya think I'd still be in the _village_ without ya? 'Cause I wouldn't. I'd never 'ave found Liv, I'd never 'ave gotten better. _Shit_ , Robert - we've been through too much together for everythin' to fall apart now."

Another pause. "We can get past this, right?"

"Can ya get better?"

"I've done it before. And I've got you this time."

"Then yeah. We can."

Liv hears a kiss, hears the fabric of their shirts collide in an embrace, and though she's so dehydrated she's practically dizzy, the relief coursing through her is indescribable. She stands, legs shaking, and turns to climb the stairs (dodging that dodgy floorboard that creaks loudly enough to wake Chas up), slotting back into her room with a quietness learned from years of sneaking out. 

Her bed looks more inviting than it ever has. As she dives into the covers, she hears footsteps making their way up the stairs, and reaches for her headphones.

Just in case.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> On the topic of drugs, oh my god, Holly! I never saw that one coming! Rest in peace to her, that entire episode was utterly heartbreaking :'(
> 
> I'm on [tumblr](http://hissing-miseries.tumblr.com) if you ever want to pop in and say hello!


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